THE 


LIFE  AND  PUBLIC  SERVICES 


HON.  ABRAHAM  LINCOLN. 


BY  D.   W.   BARTLETT, 

WASHINGTON  CORRESPONDENT  OF  THE  NEW-YORK  INDEPENDENT  AND  EVENING  POST, 

AND  AUTHOR  OF  "  LIVES  OF  MODERN  AGITATORS,"  LIJB  OF  "  LADT 

JANE  GRAY,"  "  JOAJi  OF  ARC,"  STO. 


H.    DAYTON,    PUBLISHEE, 

No.    3G    HOWARD-STREE.T. 

I860. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1830,  by 
H.    DAYTON, 

In  the  Clerk's  office,  of  the  District  Court,  for  the  Southern  District  of 
New-York. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
SANTA  BARBARA  COLLEGE  LIBRAE* 


PREFACE, 

BUT  a  single  word  is  necessary.  Every  reader  will 
easily  understand  that  a  "campaign"  life  of  any  man, 
got  up  with  despatch,  is  like  neither  "  Boswell's  John- 
son" nor  "  Lockhart's  Scott,"  They  were  the  work  of 
years— this  of  days.  But  it  is  believed  that  this  is  an 
accurate  life  of  Mr.  Lincoln  in  every  respect,  and  as 
such,  we  send  it  forth  to  take  its  share  in  the  great 
work  of  making  Abraham  Lincoln  next  President  of 

these  United  States. 

D.  W.  B. 

WASHINGTON,  D.  C.,  June   1st,  1860. 


V/1MJAM  Y77LSS 

I" DIVERSITY  CP  CALIFORNIA 
SANTA  BARi'ARA,  COLLEGE 


LIFE    AND    SPEECHES 


OP 


PART     FIRST. 

EARLY    HISTORY. 

ABRAHAM  LINCOLN  is  a  native  of  the  county  of 
Hardin,  Kentucky.  He  was  born  February  12,  1808. 
His  parents  came  from  Virginia,  and  it  is  said  made  no 
pretensions  of  belonging  to  "  one  of  the  first  families." 
His  grandfather,  Abraham  Lincoln,  emigrated  from 
Rockingham  county,  Virginia,  to  the  State  of  Ken- 
tucky, about  the  year  1781.  A  year  or  two  later  than 
this,  he  was  killed  by  the  Indians,  while  at  work  in  the 
forest.  Mr.  Lincoln's  earlier  ancestors  were  members 
of  the  Society  of  Friends,  and  went  to  Virginia  from 
Berks  county,  Pennsylvania,  where  some  of  the  family 
still  reside. 

Mr.  Lincoln's  father,  at  the  death  of  his  father,  in 
1783,  was  but  six  years  old.  He  removed  to  what  is 
now  Spencer  county,  Indiana,  in  1816.  The  early, 


14  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

Indiana  life  of  Mr.  Lincoln  is  thus  described  by  one 
of  his  friends  : 

"  The  family  reached  their  new  home  about  the  time 
the  State  was  admitted  into  the  Union.  The  region  in 
which  they  settled  was  rude  and  wild,  and  they  en- 
dured, for  some  years,  the  hard  experience  of  a  frontier 
life,  in  which  the  struggle  with  nature  for  existence  and 
security  is  to  be  maintained  only  by  constant  vigilance. 
Bears,  wolves,  and  other  wild  animals,  still  infested  the 
woods,  and  young  Lincoln  acquired  more  skill  in  the 
use  of  the  rifle  than  knowledge  of  books.  There  were 
institutions  here  and  there,  known  by  the  flatter- 
ing denomination  of  "  schools,"  but  no  qualification 
was  required  of  a  teacher  beyond  "  readin',  writin',  and 
ciphering"  as  the  vernacular  phrase  ran,  as,far  as  the 
rule  of  three.  If  a  straggler,  supposed  to  understand 
Latin,  happened  to  sojourn  in  the  neighborhood,  he 
was  looked  upon  as  a  wizard,  and  regarded  with  an 
awe  suited  to  so  mysterious  a  character. 

"  Hard  work,  and  plenty  of  it,  was  the  order  of  the 
day,  varied,  indeed,  by  an  occasional  bear-hunt,  a  not 
unfrequent  deer-chase,  or-  other  wild  sport.  Of  course, 
when  young  Lincoln  came  of  age,  he  was  not  a  scholar. 
He  could  read  and  write,  and  had  some  knowledge  of 
arithmetic,  but  that  was  about  all ;  and  as  yet,  he  had 
but  little  ambition  to  know  more  of  what  was  to  be 
found  in  books.  His  attainments  otherwise  were  not 
to  be  despised.  He  had  grown  to  be  six  feet  four  inches 
in  stature,  was  active  and  athletic,  could  wield  the  axe, 
direct  the  plough,  or  use  the  rifle,  as  well  as  the  best  of 
his  compeers,  and  was  fully  up  to  all  the  mysteries  of 
prairie  farming,  and  fully  inured  to  hardship  and  toil. 


ABEAHAM     LINCOLN.  15 

Since  he  arrived  at  age  he  has  not  been  to  school. 
Whatever  his  acquirements  are,  they  have  been  picked 
up  from  time  to  time  as  opportunity  occurred,  or  as 
the  pressure  of  some  exigency  demanded." 

At  the  age  of  twenty-one  he  removed  to  the  State 
of  Illinois,  which  was  thereafter  to  be  his  home.  The 
first  year  he  passed  in  Macon  county,  in  hard  labor 
upon  a  farm,  where  he  and  a  fellow-laborer  of  the  name 
of  Hawkes,  in  the  year  1830,  split  three  thousand  rails. 
He  also,  at  one  time,  managed  a  flat-boat  on  the  Ohio 
river.  From  Macon  county  he  went  to  New  Salem, 
now  Menard  county,  where  he  remained  a  year.  Then 
the  Black-Hawk  war  broke  out.  A  company  of  volun- 
teers was  raised  in  his  county,  and  he  was  elected  its 
captain.  He  served  through  the  war,  and  gained  much 
popularity.  It  may  not  be  amiss  to  give  a  sketch 
here  of  the  origin  of  this  war,  which  engaged  Lincoln's 
services  at  so  early  an  age,  and  we  make  the  subjoined 
extracts  from  Broicn's  History  of  Illinois,  for  that 
purpose  : 

THE    BLACK-HAWK    WAR. 

Black-Hawk,  the  Indian  chief,  who  has  recently 
occupied  a  considerable  space  in  the  public  mind,  and 
cost,  it  is  said,  the  United  States  more  than  two  mil- 
lions of  dollars,  was  born,  as  it  was  supposed,  about 
the  year  1767,  on  Hock  river,  in  Illinois. 

At  the  time  of  which  we  are  about  to  speak,  the 
Winnebagoes  occupied  all  that  part  of  the  Wisconsin 
territory  bordering  on  the  river  Wisconsin  and  in  the 
vicinity  of  Winnebago  lake.  Their  population  in  1820 
was  estimated  at  one  thousand  five  hundred  and  fifty 


16  LIFE    AND     SPEECHES    OF 

souls,  of  whom  five  hundred  were  warriors.  White 
Toni  was  a  conspicuous  chief  among  them.  He  op- 
posed General  Wayne  in  1794 — fought  at  Tippecanoe 
in  1811 — was  active  during  the  war  of  1812  on  the 
side  of  the  British,  and  treated  with  General  Harrison 
at  Greenville,  in  1814. 

The  Menomonies  resided1  still  farther  north,  upon 
a  river  of  that  name,  in  the  vicinity  of  Green  Bay. 
They  were  estimated  in  1860  at  three  hundred  and  fifty 
souls,  of  whom  one  hundred  were  warriors. 

The  Pottawatomies  occupied  the  head  waters  of 
Lake  Michigan  ;  they  were  estimated  in  1820  at  three 
thousand  four  hundred  souls.  The  United  States  paid 
them,  yearly,  five  thousand  seven  hundred  dollars. 
The  Pottawatomies  were  known  to  the  French  at  an 
early  day.  In  1668,  three  hundred  of  these  warriors 
visited  Father  Allouez  at  Chegaumegon,  an  island  in 
Lake  Superior. 

The  Sacs  (or  rather  the  Sauks)  and  Foxes — usually 
mentioned  together  (one  nation,  in  fact),  occupied  the 
country  west  of  the  Pottawatomies,  between  the  Illi- 
nois and  Mississippi  rivers  ;  they  were  estimated,  in 
1860,  at  three  thousand  souls.  They  were  also  known 
to  the  French,  and  Christianity  was  taught  them  by 
the  Jesuits,  in  1668.  Keokuk  was,  for  many  years,  a 
conspicuous  chief  among  them,  as  also  Black-Hawk, 
before  referred  to.  The  latter  was  a  grandson  of  Na- 
na-ma-kee,  or  Thunder,  and  having  taken  the  scalp  of 
an  enemy  at  the  early  age  of  fifteen,  was  admitted  to 
the  rank  of  "  a  brave,"  A  short  time  afterward  he 
joined  a  war  party  against  the  Osages,  and  became  no- 
ted for  his  valor.  On  his  return  he  was  allowed  to  join 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  17 

the  war-dance  of  his  nation.  He  frequently  led  war 
parties  against  the  enemies  of  his  tribe,  and,  in  almost 
every  instance,  was  victorious. 

On  the  27th  of  June,  1804,  a  treaty  was  made  at  St. 
Louis,  by  General  Harrison,  with  the  Sacs  and  Foxes, 
and  the  lands  east  of  the  Mississippi  were  ceded  to  the 
United  States.  This  treaty,  having  been  executed,  as 
Black-Hawk  pretended,  without  the  knowledge  or  con- 
sent of  the  nation,  was  the  subject  of  much  altercation 
and  serious  difficulty  thereafter. 

The  territory  of  Illinois,  in  1818,  having  been  admit- 
ted into  the  Union,  and  peace  between  Great  Britain 
and  United  States  restored,  emigrants  from  every  di- 
rection repaired  thither,  and  the  country  of  the  Sacs 
and  Foxes  was  shortly  surrounded  by  the  settlements 
of  white  men.  In  order  to  hasten  the  departure  of  the 
Indians  from  the  ceded  territory,  some  outrages,  it  is 
said,  and  we  have  no  doubt  of  the  fact,  were  committed 
on  their  persons  and  eifects. 

On  the  19th  of  August,  1828,  a  treaty  was  held  at 
Prairie  du  Chien,  with  the  Sacs,  Foxes,  Winnebagoes, 
Chippewas,  Sioux,  and  other  northwestern  tribes,  by 
William  Clark  and  Lewis  Cass,  in  behalf  of  the  United 
States,  for  the  purpose  of  bringing  about  a  peace  be- 
tween the  Sacs  and  other  tribes.  The  United  States 
undertook  the  part  of  mediators.  However  pure  their 
motives,  the  effect  was  not  such  as  could  have  been  de- 
sired. Hostilities  continued,  and  murders  frequently 
happened.  In  the  summer  of  1821,  a  party  of  twenty- 
four  Chippewas,  on  a  tour  to  Fort  Snelling,  were  sur- 
prised by  a  band  of  Sioux,  and  eight  of  their  number 
were  killed  and  wounded.  The  commander  of  Fort 


18  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES    OF 

Snelling  caused  some  of  the  Sioux  to  be  delivered  to  the 
Chippewas,  by  whom  they  were  shot.  Red-Bird,  a 
chief  of  the  Sioux,  resented  the  affront,  and  determined 
to  retaliate.  He,  accordingly,  led  a  party  against  the 
Chippewas,  and  was  defeated.  On  his  return  home  he 
was  derided  as  being  "  no  brave."  Ked-Bird  being 
disappointed  of  vengeance  upon  the  Chippewas,  deter- 
mined to  seek  it  among  their  abettors,  the  whites  ;  and 
on  the  24th  of  July,  1827,  two  whites,  in  the  vicinity 
of  Prairie-du-Chien,  were  killed  and  another  wounded, 
and  on  the  30th  of  July,  two  keel-boats,  conveying  mil- 
itary stores  to  Fort  Snelling,  were  attacked,  two  of 
their  crew  killed  and  four  wounded.  Black-Hawk  was 
charged,  among  others,  with  this  last  offence. 

General  Atkinson  thereupon  marched  with  a  brigade 
of  troops,  regulars  and  militia,  into  the  Winnebago 
country,  and  made  prisoners  of  Red-Bird  and  six  others, 
who  were  held  in  confinement  at  Prairie-du-Chien  until 
a  trial  could  be  had.  Red-Bird  died  in -prison.  A  part 
of  those  arrested  were  convicted  and  a  part  acquitted. 
Black-Hawk,  after  a  year's  imprisonment,  was  dis- 
charged, not  for  want  of  guilt  but  for  want  of  proof. 
Matters  remained  in  this  state  for  about  three  years. 
Though  violence  was  frequently  done  punishment  sel- 
dom followed. 

A  treaty,  on  the  15th  of  July,  1830,  had  been  made, 
by  which  the  Sacs  and  Foxes  ceded  all  their  country 
east  of  the  Mississippi  to  the  United  States  ;  but  Black- 
Hawk  had  nothing  to  do  with  it.  Keokuk,  or  the 
Watchful  Fox,  at  this  time  headed  the  Sacs,  who  made 
the  treaty.  Black-Hawk,  when  apprized  of  what  they 
had  done,  disapproved  of  it,  and  was  much  agitated. 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  19 

Kookuk  was  a  friend  of  the  Avhites,  and  Black-Hawk 
used  to  say,  sold  his  country  for  nothing. 

About  the  time  of  the  execution  of  the  treaty  of 
Prairie-du-Chien,  several  outrages  were  committed  on 
the  Indians  by  the  whites,  which  served  to  exasperate 
still  more  those  already  excited. 

Black-Hawk,  when  he  first  learned  that  Keokuk  had 
sold  the  Sac  village,  with  the  rest  of  the  country  on  the 
east  side  of  the  Mississippi,  remonstrated  with  him  on 
the  subject  ;  and  "  Keokuk  was  so  well  satisfied,"  says 
Black-Hawk,  "  that  he  had  done  what  he  had  no  right 
to  do,  and  what  he  ought  not  to  have  done,  that  he 
promised  to  go  to  the  whites  and  endeavor  to  get  it 
back  again."  Black-Hawk  agreed  to  give  up  the  lead 
mines  if  he  could  be  allowed  to  enjoy  their  old  village 
and  the  little  point  of  land  which  their  wives  had  cul- 
tivated for  years,  undisturbed,  and  the  graves  of  their 
fathers. 

Belying  on  the  promise  of  Keokuk,  the  Sacs  set 
out  on  their  winter's  hunt,  in  the  fall  of  1830,  as 
usual.  Returning  thence,  in  the  spring  of  1831,  they 
found  the  whites  in  possession  of  their  villages,  and 
their  wives  and  children,  on  the  banks  of  the  Missis- 
sippi, without  a  shelter.  "  This,"  says  Black-Hawk, 
"  is  insufferable.  Where  is  there  a  white  man  who 
could  or  would  endure  this  ?  None  !  not  the  most 
servile  slave..  Their  village  they  would,"  said  Black- 
Hawk,  "  again  possess."  They  acted  in  accordance 
with  this  resolution,  and  went  and  again  took  posses- 
sion. The  whites  were  alarmed,  and,  doubting  their 
ability  to  drive  them  off,  the  Indians  said  they  could 
live  and  plant  together. 


20  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES    OF 

The  Indians  had  been  told,  in  the  fall  of  1830,  that 
they  must  not  come  again  east  of  the  Mississippi.  Soon 
afterward  the  lands  they  had  occupied}  or  part  of  them, 
were  sold  to  private  adventurers,  and  the  Indians  were 
ordered  to  leave  them.  Black-Hawk  and  his  band  re- 
fused to  go.  The  settlers  thereupon  exclaimed  against 
Indian  encroachments,  and  Governor  Reynolds  forth- 
with declared  trie'  State  ef  Illinois  invaded  by  liostile 
savages. 

On  the  28th  day  of  May,  1831,  Governor  Reynolds 
wrote  to  General  Gaines,  the  military  commander  of 
the  western  department,  that  he  had  received  undoubted 
information,  that  a  section  of  the  State,  near  Rock 
Island,  was  invaded  by  a  hostile  band  of  the  Sac  In- 
dians, headed  by  Black-Hawk  ;  that  to  repel  said  in- 
vasion and  protect  the  citizens  of  Illinois,  he  had  called 
on  seven  hundred  of  the  militia  of  said  State,  to  be 
mounted  and  ready  for  service  ;  and  respectfully  re- 
quested his  co-operation.  General  Gaines,  in  reply,  said 
he  had  ordered  six  companies  of  regular  troops  to  pro- 
ceed from  Jefferson  barracks  to  the  Sac  village,  and,  if 
necessary,  he  would  add  two  companies  from  Prairie- 
du-Chien.  This  he  considered  sufficient  ;  but,  con- 
tinued he,  if  the  Indian  force  should  be  augmented  by 
other  Indians,  he  would  correspond  with  his  excellency 
by  express,  and  avail  himself  of  the  mounted  volun- 
teers he  had  tendered. 

"  The  object,"  said  Governor  Reynolds,  "  of  the  State 
government,  is  to  protect  their  own  citizens,  by  remov-" 
ing  said  Indians,  '  peaceably  if  they  can,  forcibly  if 
they  must/ ' 

General  Gaines  proceeded  at  once  to  the  country  in 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  21 

dispute,  and,  by  discreet  and  prudent  management, 
succeeded  in  settling  the  most  prominent  difficulties, 
which  amounted,  on  examination,  to  little  or  nothing. 
On  the  20th  of  June,  1831,  General  Gaines  wrote  to 
the 'Secretary  of  War,  as  follows  : 

"  I  have  visited  the  Kock  River  villages,  to  ascertain 
the  localities  and  dispositions  of  the  Indians.  They 
are  resolved  to  abstain  from  hostilities,  except  in  their 
own  defence.  Few  of  their  warriors  were  to  be  seen. 
Their  women  and  children  and  old  men,  appeared  to 
be  anxious  and  none  attempted  to  run  of.  I  am  re- 
solved to  abstain  from  firing  a  shot  without  some  blood 
shed,  or  some  manifest  attempt  to  shed  blood,  on  the 
part  of  the  Indians.  I  have  already  induced  nearly 
one  third  of.  them  to  cross  the  Mississippi — the  residue 
say  they  will  not  cross,  and  their  women  urge  their  hus- 
bands to  fight,  rather  to  move  and  abandon  their  homes." 

Thus  matters  stood  till  the  Illinois  militia  arrived. 
On  the  7th  of  June,  Black-Hawk  met  General  Gaines 
and  told  him  he  should  not  remove.  On  the  25th,  the 
militia  arrived.  The  Indians,  to  avoid  difficulty,  fled 
across  the  Mississippi,  and,  on  the  26th,  the  army  took 
possession  of  the  Sac  village,  without  firing  a  gun. 
On  the  27th  Black-Hawk  raised  a  white  flag  to  indi- 
cate his  wish  for  a  parley — a  parley  ensued  and  a  treaty 
followed. 

General  Gaines  thereupon  wrote  to  the  Secretary  of 
War  that  the  Indians  were  completely  humbled  as  if 
they  had  been  chastised  in  battle,  and  less  disposed  to 
disturb  the  inhabitants  on  the  frontier.  Govenor  Rey- 
nolds likewise  expressed  the  same  opinion.  In  this, 
however,  they  were  both  mistaken.  General  Gaines 


22  LIFE     AND    SPEECHES    OF 

promised  the  Indians  corn,  in  lieu  of  what  they  had 
abandoned.  The  supply,  however,  was  insufficient, 
and  they  began  to  feel  the  effects  of  hunger.  In  this 
state  of  things  they  went  over  to  steal  corn  from  their 
own  land,  and  a  new  series  of  troubles  began,  whicli 
ended  afterward  in  bloodshed. 

In  the  spring  of  1832,  Black-Hawk  recrossed  the  Mis- 
sissippi and  moved  up  Rock  river.  Governor  Rey- 
nolds at  once  ordered  out  a  thousand  of  the  militia,  who 
were  armed  and  equipped  for  the.,  service,  and  who  came 
from  the  southern  and  central  counties  of  Illinois. 
It  was  one  of  the  companies  of  this  force  which  young 
Lincoln  commanded,  in  the  course  of  the  war,  which 
lasted  for  but  a  short  time.  In  an  engagement  with 
the  State  militia,  at  "  Stillman's  Run/'  the  Indians 
obtained  an  advantage  over  the  whites  which  alarmed 
the  entire  State.  The  Governor  called  out  three  thou- 
sand more  of  the  militia,  and  on  the  2d  of  August  a 
very  decisive  engagement  took  place  at  the  mouth  of 
the  "  Bad-Axe,"  the  Indians  experiencing  a  defeat,  and 
Black-Hawk  fled.  He  was  afterward  arrested  and 
brought  to  Washington,  where  President  Jackson  set 
him  free.  In  this  war,  as  we  have  remarked,  Mr.  Lin- 
coln served  with  faithfulness  and  success. 

HIS    PROGRESS   UPWARD. 

Returning  to  Sangamon  county,  Mr.  Lincoln  studi- 
ed surveying,  and  prosecuted  that  profession  until  the 
financial  crash  of  1837  destroyed  the  value  of  real 
estate  and  ruined  the  business — the  result  of  which  was 
that  young  Lincoln's  surveying  apparatus  was  sold  on 
execution  by  the  sheriff.  Nothing  daunted  by  this 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN.-  23 

turn  of  ill-luck,  he  directed  his  attention  to  law,  and 
borrowing  a  few  books  from  a  neighbor,  which  he  took 
from  the  office  in  the  evening  and  returned  in  the 
morning,  he  learned  the  rudiments  of  the  profession  in 
which  he  has  since  "become  so  distinguished. 

Mr.  Lincoln  was  in  his  youth  known  as  the  swiftest 
runner,  the  best  jumper,  and  the  strongest  wrestler, 
among  his  fellows  ;  and  when  he  reached  manhood  and 
his  physical  frame  became  developed,  the  early  settlers 
pronounced  him  the  stoutest  man  in  the  State.  His 
abstemious  habits  and  his  hardy  physical  discipline 
strengthened  his  constitution  and  gave  vigor  to  his 
mind.  He  improved  every  opportunity  to  cultivate  his 
intellect,  often  studying  his  law-books  far  into  the 

»/         o 

night  by  the  reflection  of  the  log-fire  in  his  farm-home 
on  the  prairies.  He  was  early  distinguished  for  a  dis- 
putational  turn  of  mind,  and  many  are  the  intellectual 
triumphs  of  his  in  the  country  or  village  lyceum  select- 
ed by  old  settlers  who  remember  him  as  he  then 
appeared.  His  strong,  natural,  direct,  and  irresistible 
logic  marked  him  there  as  it  has  ever  since,  as  an 
intellectual  king. 

The  deep  snow  which  occurred  in  the  winter  of 
1830-'31,  was  one  of  the  chief  troubles  enduredby  the 
early  settlers  of  Central  and  Southern  Illinois.  Its 
consequences  lasted  through  several  years.  The  peo- 
ple were  illy  prepared  to  meet  it,  as  the  weather  had 
been  mild  and  pleasant — unprecedentedly  so  up  to 
Christmas — when  a  snow-storm  set  in,  which  lasted  two 
days  ;  something  never  before  known  even  among  the 
traditions  of  the  Indians,  and  never  approached  in  the 
weather  of  any  winter  since.  The  pioneers  who  came 


24  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

» 

into   the   State  (then   a   territory)  in  1800,  some   of 
whom  are  still  living,  say  the  average  depth  of  snow 
was  never,  previous  to  1830,  more  than  knee  deep  to 
an  ordinary  man,  while  it  was  breast  high  all  that  winter, 
not  in  drifts  but  over  a  whole  section.     "For  three 
months/'  say  the  old   settlers,  "  there  was  not  a  warm 
sun  upon  the  surface  of  the  snow."     It  became  crusted 
over,  so  as  (in  some  cases)  to  bear  teams.     Cattle  and 
horses  perished,  the  winter  wheat  was  killed,  the  mea- 
gre stocks  of  provisions  ran  out,  and  the  most  wealthy 
settlers  came  near  starving,  while  some  of  the  poorer 
ones  actually  did.     It  was  in  the  midst  of  such  scenes 
that  young  Abraham  Lincoln  attained  his  majority,  and 
commenced  his  career  of  bold  and  manly  independence. 
It  was  this  discipline  that  was  to  try  the  soul  of  the 
future  President.     Communication  between  house  and 
'house  was  often  entirely  obstructed  for  teams,  so  that 
the  young  and  strong  men  had  to  do  all  the  travelling 
on  foot  ;  carrying  from  one  neighbor  what  of  his  store 
he  could  spare  to  another,  and  bringing  back  some- 
thing in  return  sorely  needed.     Men  living  five,  ten, 
twenty,  and  thirty  miles  apart  were  called  "  neighbors" 
then.      Young  Lincoln  was  always  ready  to  perform 
these  acts  of  humanity,  and  foremost  ini  the  counsels 
of  the  settlers  when  their   troubles  seemed  gathering 
like  a  thick  cloud  about  them. 

"  About  this  time,"  says  one  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  friends, 
"  the  Whigs  of  this  county  conferred  upon  him  a  nom- 
ination for  the  Legislature.  He  was  successful  in  this 
and  three  succeeding  elections,  by  triumphant  majori- 
ties. While  a  member  of  the  Legislature  he  first  gave 
indications  of  his  superior  powers  as  a  debater,  and  he 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  25 

increased,  by  frequent  practice,  his  natural  faculty  for 
public  speaking.  He  improved  industriously  the  op- 
portunities that  were  here  offered  of  self-cultivation. 
From  the  position  of  a  subaltern  in  the  ranks  of  the 
Whig  party,  a  position  that  was  appropriately  assigned 
him  by  his  unaffected  modesty  and  humble  pretensions, 
he  soon  became  recognized  and  acknowledged  as  a 
champion  and  leader,  and  his  unvarying  courtesy,  good 
nature,  and  genial  manners,  united  with  an  utter  dis- 
interestedness and  abnegation  of  self,  made  him  a  uni- 
versal favorite. 

"  During  his  legislative  period  he  continued  his  law 
studies,  and  removing  to  Springfield  he  opened  an  of- 
fice aud  engaged  actively  in  practice.  Business  flowed 
in  upon  him,  and  he  rose  rapidly  to  distinction  in  his 
profession.  He  displayed  remarkable  ability  as  an  ad- 
vocate in  jury  trials,  and  many  of  his  law  arguments 
were  master-pieces  of  logical  reasoning.  There  was  no 
refined  artificiality  in  his  forensic  efforts.  They  all 
bore  the  stamp  of  masculine  common  sense  ;  and  he 
had  a  natural  easy  mode  of  illustration,  that  made  the 
most  abstruse  subjects  appear  plain.  His  success  at 
the  bar,  however,  did  not  withdraw  his  attention  from 
politics.  For  many  years  he  was  the  '  wheel-horse'  of 
the  whig  party  of  Illinois,  and  was  on  the  electoral 
ticket  in  several  Presidential  campaigns.  At  such 
time  he  canvassed  the  State  with  his  usual  vigor  and 
ability.  He  was  an  ardent  friend  of  Henry  Clay,  and 
exerted  himself  powerfully  in  his  behalf,  in  1844,  trav- 
ersing the  eutire  State  of  Illinois,  and  addressing  pub- 
lic meetings  daily  until  near  the  close  of  the  campaign, 
when  becoming  convinced  that  his  labors  in  that  field 
would  be  unavailing,  he  crossed  over  into  Indiana,  and 
continued  his  efforts  up  to  the  day  of  election.  The 
contest  of  that  year  in  Illinois  was  mainly  on  the  tariff 
question.  Mr.  Lincoln,  on  the  whig  side,  and  John 
Calhoun  on  the  democratic  side,  were  the  heads  of  the 
opposing  electoral  tickets.  Calhoun,  late  of  Nebraska, 

2 


26  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

now  dead,  was  then  in  the  full  vigor  of  his  powers,  and 
was  accounted  the  ablest  debater  of  his  party.  They 
stumped  the  State  together,  or  nearly  so,  making 
speeches  usually  on  alternate  days  at  each  place,  and 
each  addressing  large  audiences  at  great  length,  some- 
times four  hours  together.  Mr.  Lincoln,  in  these  elab- 
orate speeches,  evinced  a  thorough  mastery  of  the  prin- 
ciples of  political  economy  which  underlie  the  tariff 
question,  and  presented  arguments  in  favor  of  the  pro- 
tective policy  with  a  power  and  conclusiveness  rarely 
equalled,  and  at  the  same  time  in  a  manner  so  lucid 
and  familiar,  and  so  well  interspersed  with  happy  illus- 
trations and  apposite  anecdotes,  as  to  establish  a  repu- 
tation which  he  has  never  since  failed  to  maintain,  as 
the  ablest  leader  in  the  Whig  and  Eepublican  ranks  in 
the  great  West." 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  27 


PAKT    SECOND. 

IN    CONGRESS. 

IN  1846,  Mr.  Lincoln  was  elected  to  Congress  from 
the  central  district  of  Illinois. 

He  took  his  seat  in  Congress  on  the  first  Monday\m 
December,  of  the  year  1847.  It  was  the  Thirtieth 
Congress,  and  the  House  of  Kepresentatives  to  which 
he  was  elected  was  presided  over  by  Mr.  Winthrop  of 
Massachusetts.  The  House  was  composed  of  117 
Whigs,  110  Democrats,  and  1  Native  American.  Illi- 
nois then  had  seven  representatives,  and  all  were  Dem- 
ocrats but  Mr.  Lincoln.  He  alone  from  that  State  held 
up  the  old  Whig  banner.  With  him,  from  other 
States,  were  associated  such  well-known  names  as  the 
following  :  Collamer,  Marsh,  Ashmun,  Truman  Smith, 
Hunt,  Tallmadge,  Ingersoll,  Botts,  Groggin,  Cling- 
man,  Stephens,  Toombs,  Gentry,  and  Thompson.  Op- 
posed to  him  in  politics  were  men  like  Wilmot,  Brod- 
head,  Boyd,  Bocock,  Rhett,  Brown,  Linn  Boyd,  Andrew 
Johnson,  etc.,  etc.  In  the  Senate  were  Webster,  Cal- 
houn,  Dayton,  Davis,  Dix,  Dickinson,  Hunter,  Hale, 
B  -11,  Crittenden,  and  Corwin.  It  was  a  Congress  full 
of  the  most  talented  men — crowded  with  the  real  states- 
men of  the  country,  and  such  a  one  in  these  and  other 
respects  as  the  country  rarely  elects  to  make  its  laws. 
It  turned  out  to  be  one  of  the  most  excited,  agitated, 
and  agitating  ever  convened. 


28  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

HARBOR    AND    RIVER    BILL. 

One  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  first  votes  was  given,  Decem- 
ber 20,  1847,  in  favor  of  the  subjoined  resolution  : 

"  Resolved,  That  if,  in  the  judgment  of  Congress,  it  be 
necessary  to  improve  the  navigation  of  a  river  to  expe- 
dite and  render  secure  the  movements  of  our  army,  and 
save  from  delay  and  loss  our  arms  and  munitions  of 
war,  that  Congress  has  the  power  to  improve  such 
river. 

"  Resolved,  That  if  it  be  necessary  for  the  preservation 
of  the  lives  of  our  seamen,  repairs,  safety,  or  main- 
tenance of  OUT  vessels-of-war,  to  improve  a  harbor  or 
inlet,  either  on  our  Atlantic  or  Lake  coa-st,  Congress 
has  the  power  to  make  such  improvement." 

A  motion  was  made  to  lay  the  resolution  on  the  ta- 
ble, and  Mr.  Lincoln  voted  with  the  other  Whigs  then 
in  the  House  against  the  motion,  and  it  was  de- 
feated. The  resolution  was  laid  over  after  this  test 
vote  to  another  day  for  debate. 

SLAVERY    I¥    THE    DISTRICT    OF    COLUMBIA. 

The  next  day  the  slavery  question  was  agitated  in 
the  House.  Mr.  Giddings  presented  a  memorial  from 
certain  citizens  of  the  District  of  Columbia,  asking 
Congress  to  repeal  all  laws  upholding  the  slave-trade 
in  the  district.  Mr.  Giddings -moved  to  refer  the  me- 
morial to  the  Judiciary  Committee,  with  instructions 
to  inquire  into  the  constitutionality  of  all  laws  by  which 
slaves  are  held  as  property  in  the  District  of  Columbia. 
A  motion  was  made  to  lay  the  paper  on  the  table.  Mr. 
Lincoln  voted  against  the  motion.  The  result  was  a 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  29 

tie  vote,  and  the  Speaker  voted  in  the  negative.  Mr. 
Howell  Cobb  stated  that  he  wished  to  debate  it,  and  it 
lay  over  under  the  rules. 

On  the  22d  of  December,  Mr.  Went  worth  of  Illinois 
moved  the  following  resolution  : 

"Itesolved,  That  the  General  Government  has  the 
power  to  construct  such  harbors,  and  improve  such 
rivers  as  are  necessary  and  proper  for  the  protection  of 
our  navy  and  commerce,  and  also  for  .the  defences  of 
our  country." 

A  motion  was  made  to  lay  an  the  table,  and  then 
withdrawn.  An  exciting  contest  ensued  on  the  de- 
mand for  the  previous  question.  It  was  sustained,  and 
the  House  came  to  a  direct  vote  on  the  resolution, 
passing  it  by  138  ayes  to  54  nays,  Mr.  Lincoln  voting, 
of  course,  with  the  ayes. 

THE    MEXICAN    WAR. 

On  the  same  day  Mr.  Lincoln  offered  the  following 
preamble  and  resolutions  on  the  Mexican  War  : 

"  Whereas,  the  President  of  the  United  States,  in 
his  Message  of  May  11,  1846,  has  declared  that  '  the 
Mexican  government  refused  to  receive  him  [the  envoy 
of  the  United  States],  or  listen  to  his  propositions,  but, 
after  a  long-continued  series  of  menaces,  have  at  last 
invaded  our  territory,  and  shed  the  blood  of  our  fellow- 
citizens  on  our  own  soil  ;' 

"  And  again,  in  his  Message  of  December  8,  1846, 
that  '  we  had  ample  cause  of  war  against  Mexico  long 
before  the  breaking  out  of  hostilities  ;  but  even  then 
we  forbore  to  take  redress  into  our  own  hands  until 
Mexico  basely  became  the  aggressor,  by  invading  our 


30  LIFE     AND      SPEECHES     OF 

' 

soil  in  hostile  array,  and  shedding  the  blood  of  our 
citizens  ;' 

"And  yet,  again,  in  his  Message  of  December  7, 1847, 
'  The  Mexican  government  refused  even  to  hear  the 
terms  of  adjustment  which  he  (our  minister  of  peace) 
was  authorized  to  propose,  and  finally,  under  wholly 
unjustifiable  pretexts,  involved  the  two  countries  in 
war,  by  invading  the  territory  of  the  State  of  Texas, 
striking  the  first  blow,  and  shedding  the  blood  of  our 
citizens  on  our  own  soil;' 

"  And  whereas,  this  House  is  desirous  to  obtain  a 
full  knowledge  of  all  the  facts  which  go  to  establish 
whether  the  particular  spot  on  which  the  blood  of  our 
citizens  was  so  shed,  was  or  was  not,  at  that  time,  our 
own  soil :  Therefore, 

"Resolved,  by  the  House  of  Representatives,  That 
the  President  of  the  United  States  be  respectfully  re- 
quested to  inform  this  House — 

"  1st.  Whether  the  spot  on  which  .the  blood  of  our 
citizens  was  shed,  as  in  his  memorial  declared,  was  or 
was  not  within  the  territory  of  Spain,  at  least  after  the 
treaty  of  1819,  until  the  Mexican  revolution. 

"  2d.  Whether  that  spot  is  or  is  not  within  the  ter- 
ritory which  was  wrested  from  Spain  by  the  revolution- 
ary government  of  Mexico. 

"  3d.  Whether  that  spot  is  or  is  not  within  a  settle- 
ment of  .people,  which  settlement  has  existed  ever  since 
long  before  the  Texas  ^Revolution,  and  until  its  inhabi- 
tants fled  before  the  approach  of  the  United  States 
army. 

"  4th.  Whether  that  settlement  is  or  is  not  isolated 
from  any  and  all  other  settlements  of  the  Gulf  and  the 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  31 

Kio  Grande  on  the  south  and  west,  and  of  wide  unin- 
habited regions  on  the  north  and  east. 

"  5th.  Whether  the  people  of  that  settlement,  or  a 
majority  of  them,  have  ever  submitted  themselves  to 
the  government  or  laws  of  Texas  or  of  the  United 
States,  of  consent .  or  of  compulsion,  either  of  accept- 
ing office  or  voting  at  elections,  or  paying  taxes,  or 
serving  on  juries,  or  having  process  served  on  them, 
or  in  any  other  way. 

"  6th.  Whether  the  people  of  that  settlement  did  or 
did  not  flee  at  the  approaching  of  the  United  States 
army,  leaving  unprotected  their  homes  and  their  grow- 
ing crops  before  the  blood  was  shed,  as  in  the  message 
stated  ;  and  whether  the  first  blood  so  shed  was  or  was 
not  shed  within  the  enclosure  of  one  of  the  people  who 
had  thus  fled  from  it. 

"  7th.  Whether  our  citizens  whose  blood  was  shed, 
as  in  his  message  declared,  were  or  were  not,  at  that 
time,  armed  officers  and  soldiers  sent  into  that  settle- 
ment by  the  military  order  of  the  President,  through 
the  Secretary  of  War. 

"8th.  Whether  the  military  force  of  the  United 
States  was  or  was  not  so  sent  into  that  settlement  after 
General  Taylor  had  more  than  once  intimated  to  the 
War  Department  that,  in  his  opinion,  no  such  move- 
ment was  necessary  to  the  defence  or  protection  of 
Texas." 

These  resolutions  were  laid  over  under  the  rule.  We 
have  quoted  them  entire  because  one  of  the  false  charges 
of  Mr.  Lincoln's  political  opponents  is,  that  he  voted 
against  the  supplies  to  the  army.  He  was  a  Whig, 
and  took  the  position  of  the  Whigs  of  his  day,  many 


32  LIFE    AND     SPEECHES    OF 

eminent  Southern  men  included,  which  was  opposition 
to  the  declaration  of  war  with  Mexico,  by  the  Presi- 
dent, so  long  as  that  opposition  would  accomplish  any 
purpose,  which  it  would  not  when  Mr.  Lincoln  was  in 
Congress  ;  and  always,  as  these  resolutions  of  his  prove, 
objected  to  what  he  considered  a  false  statement  as  to 
the  origin  of  the  difficulties.  No  circumstances,  in  his 
opinion,  would  justify  falsehood  in  reference  to  the 
history  of  that  or  any  other  war,  and  so  he  on  every 
proper  occasion  criticised  the  language  of  the  President, 
which  repeatedly  declared  that  the  war  was  begun  by 
the  act  of  Mexico. 

SLAVERY   AGAIN. 

On  the  28th  of  December  Mr.  Lincoln  voted  to 
sustain  the  right  of  petition.  Several  citizens  of 
Indiana  petitioned  Congress  for  the  abolition  of  slavery 
in  the  District  of  Columbia,  and  Mr.  C.  B.  Smith 
moved  to  refer  the  petition  to  the  Committee  on  the 
District.  Mr.  Cabell  moved  to  lay  the  memorial  upon 
the  table,  which  motion  was  carried,  Mr.  Lincoln  voting 
against  it  and  in  favor  of  according  to  it  a  respectful 
consideration. 

On  the  30th  of  December,  a  similar  memorial  against 
the  slave-trade  was  presented  to  the  House,  and  on  a 
motion  to  lay  upon  the  table  Mr.  Lincoln  voted  again 
in  the  negative. 

January  17,  1848,  Mr.  Giddings  introduced  a  resolu- 
tion in  the  House,  reporting  certain  alleged  outrages 
against  a  colored  man  in  the  District,  and  calling  upon 
the  Speaker  to  appoint  a  select  committee  to  inquire 
into  the  expediency  of  repealing  such  acts  of  Congress 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  33 

-\ 

as  sustained  or  authorized  the  slave-trade  in  the  Dis- 
trict. The  resolution  caused  considerable  excitement, 
and  a  motion  to  lay  on  the  table  was  made  and  lost  by 
one  vote.  Mr.  Lincoln  voted  against  the  motion.  The 
resolution  was  now  before  the  House,  but  the  previous 
question  was  pending.  Questions  of  order  arose  and 
the  House  was  in  great  confusion.  Mr.  Giddings 
claimed  the  right  to  modify  his  resolution,  and  the 
Speaker  decided  that  he  had  that  right.  Mr.  Ste- 
phens, of  Georgia,  appealed  from  the  decision  of  the 
Chair.  In  answer  to  a  question,  the  Chair  stated  that 
if  the  resolution  was  modified,  a  second  motion  to  lay 
tn  the  table  would  be  in  order,  whereupon  Mr.  Stephens 
withdrew  his  appeal.  Mr.  Giddings  modified  his  reso- 
lution, and  it  was  again  moved  that  it  be  laid  on  the 
table.  This  time  the  motion  was  successful — ayes  94, 
nays  88 — Mr.  Lincoln  voting  no. 

VOTE    OF    SUPPLIES   FOB   THE   WAR. 

On  the  17th  of  February,  Mr.  Lincoln  gave  a  vote 
which  effectually  destroys  the  assertion  of  some  of  his 
political  enemies  of  this  day,  that  he  voted  against  the 
supplies  for  the  war  in  Mexico.  The  Committee  of 
Ways  and  Means  reported  a  Loan  Bill  to  raise  the 
sum  of  sixteen  millions  of  dollars  to  enable  the  gov- 
ernment to  provide  for  its  debts,  principally  incurred 
in  Mexico.  This  bill  passed  a  Whig  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives ;  ayes  192,  nays  14,  Mr.  Lincoln  voting  for 
the  bill.  This  vote  alone  disposes  of  the  slanderous 
charge  that  he  voted  against  the  supplies  because  of  the 
war  with  Mexico. 


34  LIFE  AND    SPEECHES   OF 

PUTNAM'S  RESOLUTION. 

On  the  28th  of  February  Mr.  Putnam  moved  the 
following  preamble  and  resolution  : 

"  Whereas,  In  the  settlement  of  the  difficulties  pend- 
ing between  this  country  and  Mexico,  territory  may  be 
acquired  in  which  slavery  does  not  exist  ;  and  whereas, 
Congress,  in  the  organization  of  a  territorial  govern- 
ment, at  an  early  period  of  our  political  history,  estab- 
lished a  principle  worthy  of  imitation  in  all  future  time, 
forbidding  the  existence  of  slavery  in  free  territory  : 
Therefore, 

"  Resolved,  That  in  any  territory  which  may  be  ac- 
quired from  Mexico,  over  which  shall  be  established 
territorial  governments,  slavery  or  involuntary  servi- 
tude, except  as  a  punishment  for  crime,  whereof  the  par- 
ty shall  have  been  duly  convicted,  should  be  forever  pro- 
hibited ;  and  that,  in  any  act  or  resolution  establishing 
such  governments,  a  fundamental  provision  ought  to  be 
inserted  to  that  effect." 

Mr.  Putnam  moved  the  previous  question. 

Mr.  Brodhead  moved  to  lay  the  resolution  on  the 
table. 

The  motion  to  lay  on  the  table  was  decided  by  yeas 
and  nays. 

After  the  roll  was  called  through,  Mr.  C.  J.  In<rer- 

O        /  O 

soil  rose  and  asked  leave  to  vote.  Mr.  I.  said  he  was 
not  within  the  bar  when  his  name  was  called,  but  came 
in  before  the  following  name  was  called.  Mr.  I.  said, 
if  allowed  to  vote,  he  would  vote  aye.  His  vote  was 
not  received. 

Mr.  Murphy  rose  and  said  he  was  not  within  the 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  35 

bar  when  his  name  was  called,  but  he  asked  leave  to 
vote.  It  being  objected,  to — 

Mr.  0.  J.  Ingersoll  moved  to  suspend  the  rules,  to 
allow  Mr.  Murphy  and  himself  to  vote.  Disagreed  to. 

The  result  was  then  announced,  as  follows  : 

Yeas. — Messrs.  Green  Adams,  Atkinson,  Barringer,  Barrow,  Bayly, 
Bedinger,  Birdsall,  Black,  Bocock,  Bowdou,  Bowlin,  Boyd,  Boyden, 
Brodhead,  Charles  Brown,  Albert  G.  Brown,  Burt,  Cabell,  Catlicart, 
Chase,  Clapp,  Franklin  Clark,  Beverly  L.  Clark,  Clingman,  Howell  Cohb, 
Williamson  R.  \V.  Cobb,  Cocke,  Crisfield,  Crozier,  Daniel,  Dickinson, 
Donnell,  Garnett  D^uncan,  Featherstou,  Ficklin,  French,  Fulton,  Gaines, 
Gayle,  Gentry,  Goggin,  Green,  Willard  P.  Hall,  Haralson,  Harris,  Has- 
kell,  Henley,  Hill,  Hilliard,  Isaac  E.  Holmes,  George  S.  Houston,  Inge, 
Iverson,  Jackson,  Jamieson,  Andrew  Johnson,  Robert  W.  Johnson,  Geo 
W.  Jones,  John  W.  Jones,  Kaufman,  Kennon,  Tho.  Butler  King,  La 
Sere,  Levin,  Ligon,  Lord,  Lumpkin,  Maclay,  McClernand,  McKay, 
McLane,  Mann,  Miller,  Morehead,  Morse,  Outlaw,  Pendleton,  Pettit, 
Peyton,  Phelps,  Pilsbury,  Preston,  Richardson,  Richey,  Robinson, 
Roman,  Sawyer,  Shepperd,  Simpson,  Sims,  Robert  Smith,  Stanton,  Ste- 
phens, Thlbodeaux,  Thomas,  Tompkins,  John  B.  Thompson,  Robert 
A  Thompson,  Toombs,  Turner,  Venable,  Wick,  Williams,  Wiley,  Wood- 
ward— 105. 

Nays. — Messrs.  Abbott,  Aehmun,  Bingham,  Brady,  Butler,  Canby, 
Collamer,  Collins,  Conger,  Cranston,  Crowell,  Cummins,  Dickey,  Dixon, 
Duor,  Daniel  Duncan,  Dunn,  Eckert,  Edwards,  Embree,  Nathan  Evans> 
Faran,  Farrelly,  Fisher,  Freedly,  Fries,  Giddings,  Gott,  Gregory,  GrinnelL 
Hale,  Nathan  K.  Hall,  Hammons,  James  G.  Hampton,  Moses  Hampton, 
Henry,  Elias  B.  Holmes,  John  W.  Houston,  Hubbard,  Hudson,  Hunt, 
Irvin,  Jenkins,  James  H.  Johnson,  Kellogg,  Daniel  P,  King,  Lahm,  Wil- 
liam T.  Lawrence,  Sidney  Lawrence.  Leffler,  LINCOLN,  McClelland, 
Mcllvaine,  Marsh,  Marvin,  Morris,  Mullin,  Nelson,  Nes,  Newell,  Pal- 
frey, Peaslee,  Peck,  Pollock,  Putnam,  Reynold,  Julius,  John  A.  Rock- 
well, Root,  Rumsey,  St.  John,  Schenck,  Sherrill,  Silvester,  Slingerland, 
Caleb  B.  Smith,  Trunmn  Smith,  Starkweather,  Andrew  Stewart,  Charles 
E.  Stuart,  Strohm,  Tallmadga,  Taylor,  Richard  W.  Thompson,  William 
Thompson,  Thurston,  Van  Dyke,  Vinton,  Warren,  Wentworth,  White, 
Wilrnot,  Wilson— 92, 

So  the  resolution  was  laid  on  the  table. 
Mr.  Lincoln  voted  with  the  nays. 


36  LIFE     AND    SPEECHES    OF 


THE    TEJf    REGIMENT    BILL. 

On  April  3d  Mr.  Lincoln  voted  to  suspend  the  rules 
tbat  the  Ten  Kegiment  Bill  might  be  taken  up,  and 
again  did  the  same  on  the  18th  of  the  same  month. 


THE  TAEIFF. 

June  19,  1848,  Mr.  Lincoln  put  himself  on  record  in 
favor  of  a  protective  tariff.  Mr.  Stewart  of  Penn.,  on 
that  day  moved  a  suspension  of  the  rules  to  enable  him 
to  offer  the  following  resolution  : 

"  Besolved,  That  the  Committee  of  Ways  and  Means 
be  instructed  to  inquire  into  the  expediency  of  reporting 
a  bill  increasing  the  duties  on  foreign  luxuries  of  all 
kinds  and  on  such  foreign  manufactures  as  are  now 
coming  into  ruinous  competition  with  American  labor." 

""Mr.  Lincoln  voted  in  the  affirmative. 

SLAVERY    IN    THE    TERRITORIES. 

On  the  28th  of  July,  the  fampus  bill  to  establish 
territorial  governments  for  Oregon,  California,  and 
New-Mexico,  was  taken  from  the  Speaker's  table  as  it 
came  from  the  Senate.  The  peculiar  feature  of  the 
bill  was  a  provision  in  reference  to  California  and  New- 
Mexico,  prohibiting  the  territorial  legislatures  from 
passing  laws  in  favor  or  against  slavery,  but  also  pro- 
viding that  all  the  laws  of  the  territorial  legislatures 
shall  be  subject  to  the  sanction  of  Congress.  It  will  be 
remembered  that  it- was  this  bill  which  Mr.  Webster, 
who  was  then  in  the  Senate,  opposed  in  a  great  speech  ; 
using  the  following  language  • 


ABBA  II  AM     LINCOLN.  37 

"  We  stand  here  now — at  least  I  do,  for  one — to  sa^ 
that  considering-  that  there  have  been  already  five 
new  slaveholding  States  formed  out  of  newly-acquired 
territory,  and  one  only,  at  most,  non-slaveholding 
State,  I  do  not  feel  that  I  am  called  on  to  go  farther  ; 
I  do  not  feel  the  obligation  to  yield  more.  But  our 
friends  of  the  South  say,  '  You  deprive  us  of  all  our 
rights  ;  we  have  fought  for  this  territory,  and  you 
deny  us  participation  in  it.'  Let  us  consider  this 
question  as  it  really  is  ;  and  since  the  honorable  gen- 
tleman from  Georgia  proposes  to  leave  the  case  to  the 
enlightened  and  impartial  judgment  of  mankind,  and 
as  I  agree  with  him  that  it  is  a  case  proper  to  be 
considered  by  the  enlightened  part  of  mankind,  let  us 
consider  how  the  matter  in  truth  stands.  What  is 
the  consequence  ?  Gentlemen  who  advocate  the  case 
which  my  honorable  friend  from  Georgia,  with  so  much 
ability,  sustains,  declare  that  we  invade  their  rights — 
that  we  deprive  them  of  a  participation  in  the  enjoyment 
of  territories  acquired  by  the  common  services  and  com- 
mon exertions  of  all.  Is  this  true  ?  How  deprived  ? 
Of  what  do  we  deprive  them  ?  Why,  they  say  that  we 
deprive  them  of  the  privilege  of  carrying  their  slaves, 
as  slaves,  into"  the  new  territories.  Well,  sir,  what  is 
the  amount  of  that  ?  They  say  that  in  this  way  we 
deprive  them  of  the  opportunity  of  going  into  this 
acquired  territory  with  their  property.  Their  l  prop- 
erty !' — what  do  they  mean  by  that  ?  We  certainly 
do  not  deprive  them  of  the  privilege  rff  going  into 
these  newly-aoquired  territories  with  all  that,  in  the 
general  estimate  of  human  society,  in  the  general,  and 
common,  and  universal  understanding  of  mankind,  is 
esteemed  property.  Not  at  all.  The  truth  is  just 
this  :  they  have  in  their  own  States  peculiar  laws, 
which  create  property  in  persons.  They  have  a  sys- 
tem of  local  legislation,  on  which  slavery  rests,  while 
everybody  agrees  that  it  is  against  natural  law,  or  at 
least  against  the  common  understanding  which  pre- 


38  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

vails  as  to  what  is  natural  law.  I  am  not  going  into 
metaphysics,  for  therein  I  should  encounter  the  hon- 
orable member  from  South  Carolina,  and  we  should 
wander,  in  '  endless  mazes  lost/  until  after  the  time 
for  the  adjournment  of  Congress.  The  Southern 
States  have  peculiar  laws,  and  by  those  laws  there  is 
property  in  slaves.  This  is  purely  local.  The  real 
meaning,  then,  of  Southern  gentlemen,  in  making 
this  complaint,  is,  that  they  cannot  go  into  the  terri- 
tories of  the  United  States,  carrying  with  them  their 
own  peculiar  local  law — a  law  which  creates  property 
in  persons.  This,  according  to  their  own  statement, 
is  all  the  ground  of  complaint  they  have.  Now,  here, 
I  think,  gentlemen  are  unjust  toward  us.  How  un- 
just they  are,  others  will  judge — generations  that  will 
come  after  us  will  judge. 

"  It  will  not  be  contended  that  this  sort  of  personal 
slavery  exists  by  general  law.  It  exists  only  by  local 
law.  I  do  not  mean  to  deny  the  validity  of  that  local 
law  where  it  is  established  ;  but  I  say  it  is,  after  all, 
nothing  but  local  law.  It  is  nothing  more.  And 
wherever  that  local  law  does  not  extend,  property  in 
persons  does  not  exist.  Well,  sir,  what  is  now  the 
demand  on  the  part  of  our  Southern  friends  ?  They 
say,  '  We  will  carry  our  local  laws  with  us  wherever 
we  go.  We  insist  that  Congress  does  us  injustice  un- 
less it  establishes  in  the  territory  into  which  we  wish  to 
go,  our  own  local  law/  This  demand  I,  for  one,  re- 
sist, and  shall  resist. 

"  Let  me  conclude,  therefore,  by  remarking,  that 
while  I  am  willing  to  present  this  as  presenting  my 
own  judgment  and  position,  in  regard  to  this  case — and 
I  beg  it  to  be  understood  that  I  am  speaking  for  no 
other  than  myself — and  while  I  am  willing  to  present 
this  to  the  whole  world  as  my  own  justification,  I  rest 
on  these  propositions  :  1st.  That  when  this  Constitu- 
tion was  adopted,  nobody  looked  for  any  new  acquisi- 
tion of  territory  to  be  formed  into  slaveholding  States. 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  39 

2d.  That  the  principles  of  the  Constitution  prohibited, 
and  were  intended  to  prohibit,  and  should  be  construed 
to  prohibit,  all  interference  of  the  general  government 
with  slavery  as  it  existed  and  still  exists  in  the  States. 
And  then,  that,  looking  to  the  effect  of  these  new  ac- 
quisitions which  have  in  this  great  degree  inured  to 
strengthen  that  interest  in  the  South  by  the  addition 
of  these  five  States,  there  is  nothing  unjust,  nothing  of 
which  an  honest  man  can  complain,  if  he  is  intelligent 
— and  I  feel  there  is  nothing  which  the  civilized  world, 
if  they  take  notice  of  so  humble  a  person  as  myself,  will 
reproach  me  with,  when  I  say,  as  I  said  the  other  day, 
that  I  had  made  up  my  mind,  for  one,  that,  under  no 
circumstances,  would  I  consent  to  the  further  extension 
of  the  area  of  slavery  in  the  United  States,  or  to  the 
further  increase  of  slave  representation  in  the  House  of 
Representatives." 

Mr.  Corwin,  too,  arguing  in  the  Senate  against  this 
bill,  said  : 

"  Now,  if  we  can  make  any  law  whatever,  not  con- 
trary to  the  express  prohibitions  of  the  Constitution,  we 
can  enact  that  a  man  with  $60,000  worth  of  bank 
notes  of  Maryland  shall  forfeit  the  whole  amount  if  he 
attempts  to  pass  one  of  them  in  the  territory  of  Califor- 
nia. We  may  say,  if  a  man  carry  a  menagerie  of  wild 
beasts  there,  worth  $500,000,  and  undertakes  to  exhibit 
them  there,  he  shall  forfeit  them.  The  man  comes  back 
with  his  menagerie,  and  says  that  the  law  forbade  him 
to  exhibit  his  animals  there  ;  it  was  thought  that,  as 
an  economical  arrangement,  such  things  should  not  be 
tolerated  there.  That  you  may  do.  He  of  the  lions 
and  tigers  goes  back,  having  lost  his  whole  concern. 
But  now  you  take  a  slave  to  California,  and  instantly 
your  power  fails  ;  all  the  power  of  the  sovereignly  of 
this  country  is  impotent  to  stop  him.  That  is  a 
strange  sort  of  argument  to  me.  It  has  always  been 
considered  that  when  a  State  forms  its  constitution  it 


40  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OP 

can  exclude  slavery.  Why  so  ?  Becauses  it  chances 
to  consider  it  an  evil.  If  it  be  a  proper  subject  of  le- 
gislation in  a  State,  and  we  have  absolute  legislative 
power,  transferred  to  us  by  virtue  of  this  bloody  power 
of  conquest,  as  some  say,  or  by  purchase,  as  others 
maintain,  I  ask — Why  may  we  not  act  ?  Again — 
considering  this  an  abstract  question — are  there  not  du- 
ties devolving  upon  us,  for  the  performance  of  which 
we  may  not  be  responsible  to  any  earthly  tribunal,  but 
for  which  God,  who  has  created  us  all,  will  hold  us  ac- 
countable ?  What  is  your  duty,  above  all  others,  to  a 
conquered  people  ?  You  say  it  is  your  duty  to  give 
them  a  government — may  you  not,  then,  do  everything 
for  them  which  you  are  -tiot  forbidden  to  do  by  some 
fundamental  axiomatic  truth  at  the  foundation  of  your 
constitution  ?  Show  me,  then,  how  your  action  is 
precluded,  and  I  submit.  Though  I  believe  it  ought 
to  be  otherwise,  yet,  if  the  constitution  of  my  country 
forbids  me,  I  yield.  The  constitutions  of  many  States 
declare  slavery  to  be  an  evil.  Southern  gentlemen 
have  said,  that  they  would  have  done  away  with  it  if 
possible,  and  they  have  apologized  to  the  world  and  to 
themselves  for  the  existence  of  it  in  their  States. 
These  honest  old  men  of  another  day  never  could  have 
failed  to  strike  off  the  chains  from  every  negro  in  the 
colonies,  if  it  had  been  possible  for  them  to  do  so  with- 
out upturning  the  foundations  of  society. 

•'i  v  £•  v-  v-  O 

"  My  objection  is  a  radical  one  to  the  institution 
everywhere.  I  do  believe,  if  there  is  any  place  upon 
the  globe  which  we  inhabit,  where  a  white  man 
cannot  work,  he  has  no  business  there.  If  that  place 
is  fit  only  for  black  men  to  work,  let  black  men 
alone  work  there.  I  do  not  know  any  better  law 
for  man's  good  than  that  old  one,  which  was  an- 
nounced to  man  after  the  first  transgression,  that  by 
the  sweat  of  his  brow  he  should  earn  his  bread.  I 
don't  know  what  business  men  have  in  the  world,  un- 


ABKAHAMLINCOLN.  41 

less  it  is  to  work.  If  any  man  has  no  work  of  head  or 
fcand.  to  do  in  this  world,  let  him  get  out  of  it  soon. 
The  hog  is  the  only  gentleman  who  has  nothing  to  do 
but  eat  and  sleep.  Him  we  dispose  of  as  soon  as  he 
is  fat.  Difficult  as  the  settlement  of  this  question 
seems  to  some,  it  is,  in  my  judgment,  only  so  because 
we  will  not  look  at  it  and  treat  it  as  an  original  propo- 
sition, to  be  decided  by  the  influence  its  determination 
may  have  on  the  territories  themselves.  We  are  ever 
running  away  from  this,  and  inquiring  how  it  will  af- 
fect the  "  slave  States/'  or  the  "  free  States."  The 
only  question  mainly  to  be  considered  is,  How  will  this 
policy  affect  the  territories  for  which  this  law  is  in- 
tended ?  Is  slavery  a  good  thing,  or  is  it  a  bad  thing, 
for  them  ?  With  my  views  of  the  subject,  I  must  con- 
sider it  bad  policy  to  plant  slavery  in  any  soil  where  I 
do  not  find  it  already  growing.  I  look  upon  it  as  an 
exotic,  that  blights  with  its  shade  the  soil  in  which  you 
plant  it  ;  therefore,  as  I  am  satisfied  of  our  constitu- 
tional power  to  prohibit  it,  so  I  am  equally  certain  it 
is  our  duty  to  do  so." 

For  these  reasons,  so  admirably  expressed  by  Web- 
ster and  Corwin,  standing  by  them,  and  agreeing  with 
them,  Mr.  Lincoln  voted  to  lay  the  territorial  bills 
upon  the  table,  when  they  came  up  there  for  considera- 
tion. This  was  on  the  28th  of  July,  and  after  a  scene 
of  great  confusion  and  excitement.  The  motion  to  lay 
on  the  table  was  agreed  to — ayes,  114  ;  nays,  96. 
Among  the  ayes  was  Stephens,  of  Georgia,  who  made 
the  motion.  Afterward,  on  the  2d  day  of  August, 
when  the  House  bill  for  the  organization  of  the  Terri- 
tory of  Oregon  was  before  the  House,  a  motion  was 
made  to  strike  out  that  part  of  the  bill  which  extended 
the  ordinance  of  1787  over  Oregon  Territory,  and  Mr. 
Lincoln  voted,  with  113  others,  to  retain  the  ordinance. 


42  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES   OF 

During  the  second  session  of  the  Thirtieth  Congress, 
December  12,  Mr.  Lincoln  voted  for  the  following  reso- 
lution, submitted  in  the  House  by  Mr.  Eckert  : 

"Resolved,  That  the  Committee  of  Ways  and 
Means  be  instructed  to  inquire  into  the  expediency  of 
reporting  a  Tariff  Bill,  based  upon  the  principles  of 
the  tariff  of  1842." 

On  the  13th,  Mr.  Palfrey,  of  Mass.,,  asked  leave  to 
introduce  a  bill  for  the  repeal  of  all  the  acts  of  Con- 
gress establishing  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia. 
Mr.  Lincoln,  not  believing  in  the  expediency  of  inter- 
vention against  slavery  in  the  District,  without  com- 
pensation to  the  slave-owner,  separated  himself  from 
several  of  his  political  friends,  and  voted  against  the 
proposition  of  Mr.  Palfrey. 

THE    TERRITOBIES. 

Later  in  the  day  Mr.  Root  offered  the  subjoined  reso- 
lution : 

"Resolved,  That  the  Committee  on  Territories  be 
instructed  to  report  to  this  House,  with  as  little  delay 
as  practicable,  a  bill,  or  bills,  providing  a  territorial  gov- 
ernment for  each  of  the  territories  of  New-Mexico  and 
California,  and  excluding  slavery  therefrom." 

Of  the  action  of  the  House,  this  day  on  the  slavery 
question,  Dr.  Bailey,  of  the  Era,  who  was  warmly  op- 
posed to  General  Taylor's  election,  remarks  : 

"  Mr.  Palfrey  asked  leave  to  introduce  a  bill  for  the 
repeal  of  all  acts  of  Congress,  or  parts  of  acts,  estab- 
lishing or  maintaining  slavery  or  the  slave-trade  in  the 
District  of  Columbia.  Mr.  Holmes,  of  South  Carolina, 
objected,  and  the  question  being  taken  by  yeas  and 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  43 

nays,  the  vote  stood,  for  granting  leave,  70  ;  against  it, 
81.  It  will  be  observed  that  only  151  members  out  of 
228  voted.  The  House  was  not  full,  and  some  in  their 
seats  refused  to  vote.  Had  all  the  members  voted,  it  is 
doubtful  what  would  have  been  the  result.  It  wiH  be 
observed  in  our  report,  that  very  few  Democrats  of  the 
North  and  West  opposed  the  motion  for  leave.  A  few 
Northern  and  Western  Whigs  are  recorded  in  the  nega- 
tive   Mr.  Boot  brought  forward  a  resolu- 
tion, that  the  Committee  on  the  Territories  be  in- 
structed to  report  to  this  House,  with  as  little  delay  as 
practicable,  a  bill  or  bills,  providing  a  territorial  gov- 
ernment for  each  of  the  territories  of  New-Mexico  and 
California,  and  excluding  slavery  therefrom.  Hoot 
moved  the  previous  question.  Hall,  of  Missouri,  moved 
to  lay  on  the  table  ;  Giddings,  that  there  be  a  call  of 
the  House.  The  Clerk  called  the  roll — 187  members 
answered  to  their  names,  and  further  proceedings  in  the 
call  were  dispensed  with.  The  motion  to  lay  on  the 
table  was  lost — yeas  80,  nays  107.  The  previous 
question  was  seconded,  the  members  passing  through 
the  tellers." 

The  motion  was  agreed  to — ayes  106,  nays  80 — Mr. 
Lincoln,  as  usual,  standing  by  the  slavery-restriction 
clause. 

THE    GOTT    RESOLUTION. 

V 

On  the  21st  of  December,  Mr.  Gott  offered  in  the 
House  the  following  resolution  : 

"  Whereas,  The  traffic  now  prosecuted  in  this  me- 
tropolis of  the  Republic,  in  human  beings,  as  chattels, 
is  contrary  to  natural  justice  and  the  fundamental 
principles  of  our  political  system,  and  is  notoriously  a 


44  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

reproach  to  our  country  throughout  Christendom,  and 
a  serious  hinderance  to  the  progress  of  republican  lib- 
erty among  the  nations  of  the  earth  :  Therefore, 

"  Resolved,  That  the  Committee  for  the  District  of 
Columbia  be  instructed  to  report  a  bill,  as  soon  as  prac- 
ticable, prohibiting  the  slave  trade  in  said  District." 

The  resolution  having  been  read — 

Mr.  Haralson  moved  that  it  be  laid  on  the  table. 

Mr.  Wentworth  and  Mr.  Gott  demanded  the  yeas 
and  nays,  which  were  ordered. 

And  the  resolution  having  been  again  read — 

The  question  on  the  motion  of  Mr.  Haralson  was 
taken,  and  resulted — yeas  82,  nays  85. 

Mr.  Lincoln,  true  to  his  own  convictions  of  what  was 
best  under  the  circumstances,  voted  for  the  Haralson 
motion  to  table  the  resolution,  wishing  to  accompany 
such  a  bill  with  provisions  which  he  considered  neces- 
sary to  its  success. 

The  question  then  recurring  on  the  demand  for  the 
previous  question — 

Mr.  Vinton  rose  to  inquire  of  the  Chair  whether  the 
resolution  was  open  to  amendment. 

The  Speaker  said  it  would  be  open  to  amendment 
if.  the  previous  question  should  not  be  seconded. 

The  question  being  then  taken,  the  demand  for  the 
previous  question  was  seconded — yeas  85,  nays  49. 

Upon  the  question,  "  Shall- the  main  question  [upon 
the  adoption  of  the  resolution]  be  now  put  ?"  the  yeas 
and  nays  were  demanded  and  ordered  ;  and  being  taken, 
the  yeas  were  112,  nays  64. 

Mr.  Houston,  of  Alabama,  and  Mr.  Venable,  called 
for  the  yeas  and  nays  ;  which  were  ordered. 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  45 

Mr.  Donnell  inquired  of  the  Chair,  if  it  would  now 
"be  in  order  to  move  that  there  be  a  call  of  the  House. 

The  Speaker  answered  in  the  negative. 

And  the  main  question,  "  Shall  the  resolution  be 
adopted  ?"  was  then  taken,  and  decided  in  the  affirma- 
tive— yeas  98,  nays  87 — as  follows  : 

YEAS — Messrs.  Abbott,  Ashmun,  Belcher,  Bingham,  Blackmar, 
Blanchard,  Butler,  Canby,  Cathcart,  Collainer,  Conger,  Cranston, 
Crowell,  Cummins,  Darling,  Dickey,  Dickinson,  Dixon,  Daniel  Duncan, 
Edwards,  Embree,  Nathan  Evans,  Faran,  Farrelly,  Fisher,  Freedley, 
Fries,  Giddings,  Gott,  Greeley,  Gregory,  Grinnell,  Hale,  Nathan  K.  Hall, 
James  G.  Hampton,  Moses  Hampton,  Henley,  Henry,  Elias  B.  Holmes, 
Hubbard,  Hudson,  Hunt,  Joseph  R.  Ingersoll,  Irvin,  James  H.  Johnson, 
Kellogg,  Daniel  P.  King,  Lahm,  William  T.  Lawrence,  Sidney  Lawrence, 
Leffler,  Lord.  Lynde,  McClelland,  McTlvaine,  Job  Mann,  Horace  Mann. 
Marsh,  Marvin,  Morris,  Mullin,  Newell.  Nicoll,  Palfrey,  Peaslee,  Peck, 
Pettit,  Pollock,  Putnam,  Reynolds,  Richey,  Robinson,  Rockhill,  Julius 
Rockwell,  J.  A.  Rockwell,  Rose,  Root,  Rumsey,  St.  John,  Sherrill,  Sil- 
vester, Slingerland,  Robert  Smith,  Starkweather,  C.  E.  Stuart,  Strohm, 
Tallmadge,  James  Thompson,  William  Thompson,  Thurston,  Tuck, 
Turner,  Van  Dyke,  Vinton,  Warren,  Wentworth,  White  and  Wilson — 98. 

NAYS — Messrs.  Adams,  Barringer,  Beale,  Bedinger,  Bocock,  Botts, 
Bowlin,  Boyd,  Boydon,  Bridges,  William  G.  Brown,  Charles  Brown, 
Albert  G.  Brown,  Buckner,  Burt,  Chapman,  Chase,  Franklin  Clarke, 
Beverly  L.  Clarke,  Howell  Cobb,  Williamson  R.  W.  Cobb,  Coke,  Cris- 
field,  Crozier,  Daniel,  Donnell,  Dunn,  Alexander  Evans,  Featherston, 
Ficklin,  Flournoy,  French,  Fulton,  Gaines,  Gentry,  Goggin,  Green,  Wil- 
lard  P.  Hall,  Hammons,  Haralson,  Harmanson,  Harris,  Hill,  George  S. 
Houston,  John  W.  Houston,  Inge,  Charles  J.  Ingersoll,  Iverson,  Jameson, 
Andrew  Johnson,  G.  W.  Jones,  J.  W.  Jones,  Kennon,  Thomas  Butler 
King,  La  Seie,  Ligon,  Lincoln,  Lumpkin,  McClernand,  McDowell,  Mc- 
Lane,  Meade,  Miller,  Morehead,  Morse,  Outla%v,  Pendleton,  Peyton, 
Pilsbury,  Preston,  Sawyer,  She^perd,  Simpson,  Smart,  Stanton,  Ste- 
phens, Strong,  Thihodeaux,  Thomas,  R.  W.  Thompson,  Tompkins, 
Toombs,  Venable,  Wallace,  Wiley,  Williams,  and'  Woodward — 88. 

So  the  resolution  was  adopted. 
The  National  Era,  which  was  not  inclined  to  show 
much  mercy  toward  the  supporters  of  Mr.  Taylor's 


46  LIFE    AND     SPEECHES    OF 

N 

Administration,  gave  the  following  explanation  of  cer- 
tain votes  cast  against  the  resolution  : 

"  Men  will  wonder,  twenty-five  years  hence,  how 
eighty-seven  men,  in  an  American  Congress,  could 
stand  up  before  God,  and  virtually  vote  for  the  con- 
tinuance of  the  trade  in  human  beings  in  the  capital 
of  the  foremost  Republic  in  the  world. 

"  We  would  be  just,  however.  A  few  members  from 
the  free  States  voting  nay  feared  any  movement  which 
might  tend,  in  their  opinion,  to  embarrass  the  question 
of  slavery  extension.  These  voted  in  the  negative  on 
the  resolution,  not  because  they  were  opposed  to  its 
object,  but  because  they  believed  this  object  could  be 
better  attained,  after  the  settlement  of  the  question  of 
slavery  in  the  territories.  While  dissenting  from  the 
policy  of  these  gentlemen,  this  statement  from  us  is  a 
simple  act  of  justice  to  them." 

PUBLIC    LANDS. 

On  the  21st  of  December,  Mr.  McClelland  in  the 
House  of  Representatives  offered  the  subjoined  resolu- 
tion : 

"  Resolved,  That  the  present  traffic  in  the  public 
lands  should  cease,  and  that  they  should  be  disposed 
of  to  occupants  and  cultivators,  on  proper  conditions, 
at  such  a  price  as  will  nearly  indemnify  the  cost  of 
their  purchase,  management,  and  sale." 

The  previous  question  was  called,  and  a  motion  was 
made  to  lay  the  resolution  on  the  table,  which  pre- 
vailed. Mr.  Lincoln  voted  against  tabling  it,  because 
he  was  ready  to  do  anything  which  should  give  the 
public  lands  to  the  people,  and  not  to  the  speculators. 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  47 


A   SLAVE    CASE. 

On  the  6th  of  January  the  slave  case — that  of  An- 
tonio Pacheco — was  reported  to  the  House,  and  was 
taken  up.  It  was  a  claim  for  the  value  of  a  slave  who 
was  hired  by  a  United  States  officer ;  betook  himself 
to  the  everglades  ;  fought  with  the  Indians  against  the 
whites  ;  was  taken  in  arms  as  an  enemy,  and  as  an 
enemy  sent  out  of  the  Territory,  for  the  purpose  of 
securing  the  lives  of  the  inhabitants. 

Mr.  Giddings,  speaking  of  the  case,  recommended 
that— 

"The  Committee  on  Military  Affairs  were  unable  to 
unite  in  a  report  upon  the  case.  Five  slaveholders, 
representing  slave  property  on  this  floor,  and  consti- 
tuting a  majority  of  the  committee,  have  reported  a 
bill  for  the  payment  of  this  amount  to  the  claimant. 
Four  Northern  members,  representing  freemen  only, 
have  made  a  minority  report  against  the  bill.  This 
report,  as  I  think,  is  sustained  by  irrefutable  argu- 
ments. 

"  The  majority  of  the  committee  assume  the  position 
that  slaves  are  regarded  by  the  Federal  Constitution 
as  property,  and  that  this  government  and  the  people 
of  the  free  States  are  bound  to  regard  them  as  prop- 
erty, and  to  pay  for  them  as  we  would  for  so  many 
mules  or  oxen  taken  into  the  public  service.  The 
minority  deny  this  doctrine.  They  insist  that  the 
Federal  Constitution  treats  them  as  persons  only,  and 
that  this  government  cannot  constitutionally  involve 
the  people  of  the  free  States  in  the  guilt  of  sustaining 
slavery  ;  that  we  have  no  constitutional  powers  to 
legislate  upon  the  relation  of  master  and  slave. 
at  *  *  # 

"  In  1772,  Lord  Mansfield  boldly  assailed  the  doc- 


48  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

trine  laid  down  in  this  Hall  to-day,  and  exhibited  its 
absurdity  in  one  of  the  ablest  opinions  to  be  found  on 
record.  From  that  period  this  doctrine  of  property  in 
man  has  found  no  supporters  under  the  government  of 
England.  With  all  our  refinement  as  a  nation  ;  with 
all  our  boasted  adherence  to  liberty,  on  this  subject  we 
are  three  quarters  of  a  century  behind  our  mother- 
country. 

"  When  Sir  Warren  Hastings  was  on  trial  in  the 
House  of  Peers,  in  1787,  Mr.  Sheridan,  speaking  on 
this  subject,  in  his  own  peculiar  and  fervid  eloquence, 
declared  that  '  allegiance  to  that  Power  which  gives  us 
the  forms  of  men,  commands  us  to  maintain  the  rights 
of  men  ;  and  never  yet  was  this  truth  dismissed  from 
the  human  heart — never,  in  any  time,  in  any  age — 
never  in  any  clime  where  rude  man  ever  had  any  social 
feelings — never  was  this  unextinguishable  truth  de- 
stroyed from  the  heart  of  man,  placed  as  it  is  in  the 
core  and  centre  of  it  by  his  Maker,  that  man  ivas  not 
made  the  property  of  man.'  This  was  the  language 
of  British  statesmen  sixty-two  years  since.  T*o-day 
we  have  before  this  branch  of  the  American  Congress 
the  report  of  a  committee  avowing  that,  under  this 
federal  government,  in  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth 
century,  '  man  is  the  property  of  his  fellow-mortal.' 
^  "  These  sentiments  of  the  British  statesmen  and  ju- 
rists inspired  the  hearts  of  our  Americans  patriots  in 
1776,  when  they  declared  it  to  be  a  '  SELF-EVIDENT 

THUTH  THAT  ALL  MEN  AKE  CREATED  EQUAL.'   When 

they  framed  our  Constitution,  they  declared  their  ob- 
ject was  '  to  establish  justice,  and  to  secure  to  them- 
selves and  their  posterity  the  blessings  of  liberty.' 
This  subject  of  holding  property  in  men  did  not  escape 
their  attention,  nor  have  they  left  us  ignorant  of  their 
views  m  regard  to  it.  Mr.  Madison,  the  father  of  the 
Constitution,  has  left  to  us  a  clear  arid  explicit  account 
of  their  intentions.  He  informs  us,  that  on 

"  '  Wednesday,  August  22,  the  Convention  proceed- 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN. 


49 


ed  to  consider  the  report  of  the  Committee  of  Detail, 
in  relation  to  duties  on  exports,  a  capitation  tax,  and 
a  navigation  act.  The  fourth  section  reported  was  as 

follows  : 

"  '  No  tax  or  duty  shall  be  laid  by  the  Legislature 
on  articles  exported  from  any  State,  nor  on  the  migra- 
tion nor  importation  of  such  persons  as  the  several 
States  shall  think  proper  to  admit  ;  nor  shall  such  mi- 
gration nor  importation  be  prohibited.' 
'  "  'Mr.  Gerry  thought  we  had  nothing  to  do  with 
the  conduct  of  the  States  as  to  slavery,  but  we  ought  to 
be  careful  not  to  give  any  sanction.' 

"  Our  people  think  with  Mr.  Gerry,  that  l  we  have 
nothing  to  do  with  slavery  in  the  States.'  We  are  de- 
termined that  we  will  not  be  involved  in  its  guilt. 
With  Mr.  Gerry,  we  intend  '  to  be  careful  to  give  it  no 
sanction.'  No,  sir  ;  we  will  not  sanction  your  slavery 
by  paying  our  money  for  the  bodies  of  slaves.  This  is 
the  doctrine  which  we  hold,  and  which  we  expect  to 
maintain  ;  yet  the  members  of  this  body  are  now  en- 
gao-ed  in  legislating  upon  the  price  of  human  flesh. 
If  we  pass  this  bill,  we  shall  give  our  most  solemn 
sanction  to  that  institution  which  Gerry  and  his  com- 
patriots detested.  Will  the  members  from  Pennsyl- 
vania, the  successors  of  Franklin  and  Wilson,  lend 
their  sanction  to  slavery,  by  voting  the  moneys  of  the 
People  to  pay  for  slaves  ? 

"  But  Mr.  Madison  tells  us  that  '  Mr.  Sherman  (ot 
Connecticut)  was  opposed  to  any  tax  on  slaves,  as 
making  the  matter  worse,  because  it  implied  they  ivere 
property.' 

"  I  understand  that  some  gentlemen  from  the  North 
admit  that  slaves  are  property.  Mr.  Sherman  and  the 
framers  of  the  Constitution  would  do  no  act  by  which 
it  could  be  implied  that  they  were  property. 

"  Mr.  Madison  also  participated  in  the  discussion 
himself';  and,  as  he  informs  us,  '  DECLARED  THAT  HE 

THOUGHT  IT  WRONG  TO  ADMIT  THAT  THERE  COULD  BE 

3 


50  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

PKOPEKTY  IN  MEN.'  And  the  report  of  the  Committee 
was  so  amended  as  to  exclude  that  idea. 

"  In  that  assemblage  of  illustrious  statesmen,  no 
man  expressed"  his  dissent  from  these  doctrines  of 
Gerry,  of  Sherman,  and  of  Madison.  These  doctrines 
are  :  1.  That  we  '  should  have  nothing  to  do  with 
slavery,  but  ought  to  be  careful  not  to  give  it  any  sanc- 
tion.' 2.  That  (  we  should  do  no  act  by  which  it  can 
be  implied  that  there  can  be  property  in  men..'  3. 
That  '  it  would  be  WRONG  FOR  us  TO  ADMIT  THAT 

THERE    CAN    BE    PROPERTY    IN    MEN.'         Such    Were    the 

views  of  those  who  framed  the  Constitution.  They 
intended  to  express  their  views  in  such  language  as  to 
be  understood.  Will  this  House  stand  by  them  ?" 

£•  -:S  it  •:.':•  v 

"  With  great  propriety  the  gentleman  from  New- 
Hampshire  inquired,  at  what  time  the  liability  of  gov- 
ernment to  pay  for  this  slave  commenced  ?  The  ques- 
tion has  not  been  answered,  nor  do  I  think  it  can  be 
answered.  The  undertaking  was  hazardous  in  the 
highest  degree.  The  troops  were  all  killed  but  two  or 
three,  by  the  enemy,  and  those  were  supposed  to  be 
dead.  This  man  alone  escaped  unhurt.  This  danger 
was  foreseen,  and  the  master  put  a  price  upon  the  ser- 
vices to  compare  with  the  risk.  Did  this  contract  bind 
the  government  to  pay  for  the  master's  loss,  admitting 
the  slave  to  have  been  property  ?  Was  it  any  part  of 
the  compact  that  the  government  should  insure  the 
property  ?  It  strikes  me  that  no  lawyer  would  an- 
swer in  4he  affirmative.  The  law  of  bailment  is  surely 
understood  by  every  tyro  in  the  profession.  The  bailee 
for  hire  is  bound  to  exercise  the  same  degree  of  care 
over  the  property  that  careful  men  ordinarily  take  of 
their  own  property.  If,  then,  the  property  be  lost,  the 
owner  sustains  such  loss.  Now,  conceding  this  man  to 
be  property,  the  government  would  not  have  been  lia- 
ble, had  he  ran  away,  or  been  killed  by  accident,  or 
died  of  sickness.  Yet,  sir,  when  property  is  lost  or 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  51 

destroyed  by  the  act  of  God  or  the  common  enemies  of 
the  country,  no  bailee  is  ever  holden  responsible — not 
even  common  carriers,  and  that  is  the  highest  species 
of  bailment.  Had  this  officer,  acting  o~n  his  own  re- 
sponsibility, agreed  to  take  this  negro  through  the 
country  for  hire  (admitting  the  man  to  have  been 
property,  and  governed  by  the  same  rules  of  law  as 
though  he  had  been  a  mule  or  an  ass),  and  he  had  been 
captured  by  the  enemy,  no  law  would  have  held  such 
bailee  liable.  But,  sir,  an  entirely  different  rule  of  law 
prevails  where  the  owner  of  a  chattel  lets  it  to  a  bailee 
for  wages.  Had  this  man  been  a  mule  or  an  ass,  and 
the  officer  had  hired  him  of  the  owner  for  wages,  to  ride 
through  that  country,  or  to  work  in  a  team,  or  in  any 
other  manner,  and  he  had  been  captured  by  the  enemy, 
the  bailee  would  not  have  been  liable,  upon  any  rule  of 
law  or  of  justice  ;  nor  would  he  have  been  liable  if  lost 
in  any  other  manner,  except  by  neglect  of  the  bailee. 

"  The  gentleman  from  South  Carolina  [Mr.  Burt] 
said  he  would  place  this  case  upon  strictly  legal  prin- 
ciples. Sir,  I  meet  the  gentleman  on  that  proposition. 
I,  too,  for  the  sake  of  the  argument,  am  willing  to 
submit  it  on  principles  of  law  ;  and  I  believe  that  no 
jurist,  or  even  justice  of  the  peace,  would  hesitate  to 
reject  the  case  on  those  grounds.  All  must  admit  that 
the  liability  of  the  government  concerning  this  man 
ceased  when  he  was  captured  by  the  enemy  ;  up  to 
this  point  the  government  was  not  liable.  I  understood 
the  author  of  this  bill  [Mr.  Burt]  to  argue,  however, 
that  we  became  liable  under  the  contract  of  bailment. 
That  contract  was  ended  when  the  man  was  captured. 
The  claimant  then  failed  to  perform  his  part  of  it. 
The  stipulation  on  the  part  of  the  master  was,  that 
the  negro  should  pilot  the  troops  from  Fort  Brooke  to 
Fort  King,  the  place  of  their  destination,  at  the  rate 
of  twenty-five  dollars  per  month.  He  was  captured 
when  only  half  the  distance  was  accomplished.  Here 
the  master  ceased  to  perform  his  compact  ;  it  was  be- 


52  LIFE     AND     SPECHES    OF 

yond  his  power  to  do  so.  The  contract  then  ceased  to 
exist  ;  and  from  that  time  forth  the  claimant  had  no 
demand  on  us,  either  in  equity  or  in  law." 

This  is  the  Antonio  Pacheco  case,  stated  at  some 
length,  for  it  involved  important  principles.  And  hero 
we  call  attention  to  the  fact  that  Mr.  Lincoln  was  nev- 
er found,  while  in  Congress,  violating  any  principle  to 
which  he  gave  his  adhesion,  no  matter  how  great  the 
temptation  or  the  emergency.  He  did  at  times  waive 
the  assertion  of  a  principle  when  he  thought  it  would 
only  result  in  irritation,  but  he  never  voted  against  one 
of  those  principles. 

The  case  above  mentioned,  came  up  in  the  House 
Nov.  6,  1849  : 

"  The  first  business  in  order  being  the  pending  mo- 
tion made  by  Mr.  Giddings  for  a  reconsideration  of  the 
vote  upon  the  engrossment  of  the  bill  to  pay  the  heirs 
of  Antonio  Pacheco  $1,000,  as  the  value  of  a  slave 
transported  to  the  West  with  the  Seminole  Indians — 

"  Mr.  Giddings  proceeded  to  address  the  House,  hav- 
ing first  declined  to  give  way  for  a  motion  by  Mr. 
Rockwell,  of  Connecticut,  that  the  House  should  con- 
sider the  bill  to  establish  a  Board  for  the  settlement  of 
private  claims. 

"  The  previous  question,  having  been  moved  upon 
the  motion  to  reconsider,  was  then  seconded,  and  the 
main  question  ordered  to  be  now  put. 

"  Mr.  Giddings,  with  a  view  to  save  the  time  of  the 
House,  withdrew  his  motion,  and  the  question  accord- 
ingly recurred  upon  the  passage  of  the  bill. 

"  Upon  this  question,   Mr.  Dickey   demanded   the 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN.  53 

yeas  and  nays,  which  were  ordered  ;  and'  the  question 
being  taken — 

"  The  Speaker  announced  the  vote — yeas  90,  nays  89. 

"  The  twelfth  rule  of  the  House  provided, '  that  in  all 
cases  of  election  by  the  House,  the  Speaker  shall  vote  ; 
in  other  cases  he  shall  not  vote,  unless  the  House  be 
equally  divided,  or  unless  his  vote,  if  given  to  the  mi- 
nority, will  make  the  division  equal ;  and  in  case  of 
such  equal  division,  the  question  shall  be  lost/ 

"The  Speaker,  proceeding  to  discharge  the  duty  thus 
imposed  upon  him,  said  : 

'"A  case  has  occurred  in  which,  under  the  rule  of 
the  House,  it  is  the  duty  of  the  Speaker  to  vote.  The 
Speaker  regrets  that  in  this,  as  in  many  other  cases,  he 
has  been  deprived  of  the  opportunity  of  listening  to  the 
full  discussion  of  the  question,  having  heard  no  speech 
except  that  which  has  been  made  this  morning,  the  de- 
bate having  taken  place  mainly  in  Committee  of  the 
Whole  on  the  private  calendar. 

"  '  The  Speaker  also  has  had  little  opportunity,  if 
any,  to  turn  his  attention  to  the  principles  or  the  facts 
involved  in  this  case.  He  cannot  shrink,  however, 
..from  giving  his  vote.  But  it  is  a  well-admitted  par- 
liamentary principle,  laid  down  in  the  books,  that 
where  the  Speaker  has  any  doubt  in  relation  to  a 
question,  his  vote  shall  be  given  in  such  a  way  as  not 
finally  to  conclude  it.  It  shall  be  given  in  such  a  way 
that  the  consideration  of  the  question  may  be  again 
open  to  the  House,  if  the  House,  under  any  circum- 
stances, shall  choose  to  reconsider  it. 

" '  The  Speaker  takes  the  opportunity  to  say,  that 
he  does  not  concur  in  full  with  either  of  the  principles 


54  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

which  have  been  maintained  on  both  sides  of  the  House. 
So  far  as  the  circumstances  of  the  case  have  come  to 
his  knowledge,  he  doubts  exceedingly  whether  the 
question  of  property  in  slaves  is  involved.  And  it  has 
been  to  him  a  matter  of  great  doubt,  from  such  part  of 
the  arguments  as  he  has  heard ' 

"  At  this  point  of  his  remarks,  the  Speaker  was  in- 
terrupted by  the  Clerk,  who  showed. him  a  paper  con- 
taining the  state  of  the  vote. 

"  The  Speaker  said  the  Clerk  was  mistaken  in  the 
vote.  The  vote  stands — ninety-one  in  the  affirmative, 
eighty-nine  in  the  negative. 

"  So  the  bill  was  declared  to  be  passed,  Mr.  Lin- 
coln voting  against  the  passage. 

"  Mr.  Burt  moved  a  reconsideration  of  the  vote  just 
taken,  and  that  the  motion  be  laid  upon  the  table  ; 
and  also  moved,  that  before  the  vote  be  taken,  there 
should  be  a  call  of  the  House. 

"  Mr.  Palfrey  appealed  to  the  gentleman  from  South 
Carolina  to  allow  him  the  floor  a  moment,  but  Mr. 
Burt  peremptorily  declined. 

"  Mr.  Wentworth  demanded  the  yeas  and  nays  upon 
the  motion  for  a  call  of  the  House,  and  being  ordered 
and  taken,  the  result  was',  yeas  78,  nays  105.  So  the 
call  was  refused. 

"  Mr.  Burt,  with  a  view,  as  he  said,  to  save  the  time 
of  the  House,  withdrew  his  motion  for  reconsideration. 

"  Mr.  Cocke  renewed  the  motion,  and  moved  that  it 
be  laid  on  the  table. 

"  Mr.  Palfrey  moved  a  call  of  the  House,  when 

"  Mr.  Cocke  withdrew  his  motion  for  reconsidera- 
tion ; '  and,  after  some  conversation  upon  points  of  or- 


ABBA  II  AM     LINCOLN.  55 

der,  the  whole  subject,  was  dropped,  and  the  bill  was 
considered  passed. 

"  Mr.  Went  worth  rose  (he  said)  to  a  privileged  ques- 
tion, and  said  that  a  mistake  had  been  discovered  at 
the  Clerk's  desk,  in  the  vote  upon  the  passage  of  the 
bill  for  the  relief  of  the  legal  representatives  of  An- 
tonio Pacheco.  He  asked  that  the  journal  might  be 
corrected. 

"  The  Speaker  stated  that  corrections  of  the  journal 
would  be  in  order  on  Monday  morning,  after  the  read- 
ing of  the  journal. 

"  Mr.  Wentworth  asked  if  it  would  not  be  in  order 
now  to  make  a  correction  in  the  vote. 

"  The  Speaker  replied  that  it  would. 

"  On  motion  of  Mr.  Stephens,  the  House  adjourned." 

On  the  following  Monday,  immediately  after  the 
reading  of  the  journal,  the  Speaker  said  : 

"  The  House  will  remember  that  the  vote  on  the 
passage  of  the  bill  for  the  relief  of  the  heirs  of  An- 
tonio Pacheco,  was  originally  made  up  by  the  Clerk, 
yeas  90,  nays  89;  and  this  record  having  been  handed 
to  the  Speaker,  and  by  him  announced  to  the  House, 
the  Speaker  proceeded  to  make  some  remarks  upon  the 
bill,  preparatory  to  giving  the  vote  contemplated  in 
such  cases  by  the  rules  of  the  House.  While  in  the 
act  of  explanation,  the  Speaker  was  interrupted  by  the 
Clerk,  who  stated  that,  on  a  more  careful  count,  the 
vote  was  found  to  be  yeas  91,  nays  89.  The  interven- 
tion of  the  Speaker  was  therefore  no  longer  allowable, 
and  the  bill  was  declared  to  have  passed  the  House. 

"  The  Chair  takes  the  earliest  opportunity  to  state 
to  the  House,  this  morning,  that,  upon  a  re-examina- 


,56  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OT 

tion  of  the  yeas  and  nays,  the  Clerk  has  ascertained 
that  an  error  was  still  made  in  the  announcement  of 
the  vote  on  Saturday.  The  vote  actually  stood,  yeas 
89,  nays  89.  The  correction  will  now,  accordingly,  l)e 
made  in  the  journal ;  and  a  case  is  immediately  pre- 
sented, agreeably  to  the  12th  rule  of  the  House,  for 
the  interposition  of  the  Speaker's  vote. 

"  At  this  stage  of  the  proceedings,  the  Speaker  was 
interrupted  by 

"  Mr.  Farrelly,  who  rose  and  called  for  a  further  cor- 
rection of  the  journal,  stating  that  he  voted  in  the 
negative  on  Saturday  last,  and  his  vote  appeared  not 
to  have  been  recorded. 

"  The  Speaker  decided  that  it  was  the  right  of  the 
gentleman  from  Pennsylvania  to  have  his  vote  recorded, 
if  he  voted  on  Saturday  last. 

"  And  the  correction  was  accordingly  made. 

"The  vote  was  then  finally  announced — yeas  89, 
nays  90. 

"  The  Speaker  stated  that  he  came  into  the  House 
this  morning  with  the  full  expectation  of  giving  his 
vote  upon  this  bill,  and  prepared  to  give  his  reasons 
for  the  vote.  But,  as  the  question  now  stood,  although 
it  might  be  in  his  power  to  vote  agreeably  to  the  letter 
of  the  12th  rule,  it  was,  in  his  opinion,  not  within  the 
contemplation  or  intention  of  the  rule  that  he  should 
vote.  The  rule  contemplated  that  the  Speaker  should 
be  allowed  to  vote  whenever  he  could  make  a  difference 
in  the  result — wherever  his  vote  would  either  pass  or 
prevent  the  passage  of  the  proposition  before  the 
House.  Under  .present  circumstances,  the  Speaker's 
vote  could  not  in  any  way  affect  the  decision  of  the 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  57 

House.  The  bill  was  already  lost  by  the  vote  as  it 
stood.  A  vote  against  the  bill  would  only  increase  the 
majority  by  which  it  was  defeated  ;  while  a  vote  in 
favor  of  the  bill  would  only  make  a  tie,  and  the  bill 
would  still  be  lost.  The  Speaker,  therefore,  did  not 
consider  himself  called  upon  to  give  any  vote  on  the 
subject." 

Subsequently  the  case  came  up  again,  on  a  motion 
to  reconsider,  and  the  bill  was  passed,  ayes  98,  nays 
92 — Mr.  Lincoln  voting  no. 

LINCOLN'S  AMENDMENT  TO  LOTT'S  RESOLUTION. 

On  the  16th  of  January,  the  celebrated  Lott  resolu- 
tion against  the  slave-trade  in  the  District  of  Colum- 
bia, was  again  before  the  House,  a  motion  to  reconsider 
having  been  entertained  previously,  and  the  considera- 
tion of  the  motion  having  been  postponed  to  this  day. 
It  will  be  remembered  that  Mr.  Lincoln  voted  to  table 
the  original  resolution,  not  liking  its  terms.  He  now, 
by  the  courtesy  of  his  colleague,  Mr.  Wentworth, 
who  had  the  floor,  offered  the  subjoined  resolution  as  a 
substitute  for  the  Lott  resolution  : 

"  Resolved,  That  the  Committee  on  the  District  of 
Columbia  be  instructed  to  report  a  bill  in  substance  as 
follows  : 

"  SEC.  1.  Be  it  enacted  by  the  Senate  and  House  of 
Representatives  of  the  United  States  in  Congress  as- 
sembled. That  no  person  not  now  within  the  District  of 
Columbia,  nor  now  owned  by  any  person  or  persons  now 
resident  within  it,  nor  hereafter  born  within  it,  shall 
ever  be  held  in  slavery  within  said  District. 

"  SEC.  2.  That  no  person  now  within  said  District  or 

3. 


58  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

now  owned  by  any  person  or  persons  now  resident  with- 
in the  same,  or  hereafter  born  within  it,  shall  ever  be 
held  in  slavery  without  the  limits  of  said  District. 
Provided,  That  officers  of  the  government  of  the 
United  States,  being  citizens  of  the  slaveholding  States, 
coming  into  said  District  on  public  business,  and  re- 
maining only  so  long  as  may  be  reasonably  necessary 
for  that  object,  may  be  attended  into  and  out  of  said 
District,  and  while  there,  by  the  necessary  servants  of 
themselves  and  their  families,  without  their  right  to 
hold  such  servants  in  service  being  thereby  impaired. 

"  SEC.  3.  That  all  children  born  of  slave  mothers 
within  said  District,  on  or  after  the.  first  day  of  January, 
in  the  year  of  our  Lord  1850,  shall  be  free  ;  but  shall 
be  reasonably  supported  and  educated  by  the  respective 
owners  of  their  mothers  or  by  their  heirs  and  represent- 
atives until  they  respectively  arrive  at  the  age  of 

years,  when  they  shall  be  entirely  free.  And  the  muni- 
cipal authorities  of  Washington  and  Georgetown,  within 
their  respective  jurisdictional  limits,  are  hereby  em- 
powered and  required  to  make  all  suitable  and  neces- 
sary provisions  for  enforcing  obedience  to  this  section, 
on  the  part  of  both  masters  and  apprentices. 

"  SEC.  4.  That  all  persons  now  within  said  District, 
lawfully  held  as  slaves,  or  now  owned  by  any  person  or 
persons  now  resident  within  said  District,  shall  remain 
such  at  the  will  of  their  respective  owners,  their  heirs 
and  legal  representatives.  Provided,  That  any  such 
owner,  or  his  legal  representatives,  may  at  any  time  re- 
ceive from  the  treasury  of  the  United  States  the  full 
value  of  his  or  her  slave  of  the  class  in  this  section 
mentioned  ;  upon  which  such  slave  shall  be  forthwith 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.'  59 

and  for  ever  free.  And  provided  further,  That  the 
President  of  the  United  States,  the  Secretary  of  State, 
and  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  shall  be  a  board, 
for  determining  the  value  of  such  slaves  as  their  own- 
ers may  desire  to  emancipate  under  this  section,  and 
whose  duty  it  shall  be  to  hold  a  session  for  the  pur- 
pose, on  the  first  Monday  of  each  calendar  month  ;  to 
receive  all  applications  and  on  satisfactory  evidence  in 
each  case,  that  the  person  presented  for  valuation  is  a 
slave,  and  of  the  class  in  this  section  mentioned,  and  is 
owned  by  the  applicant,  shall  value  such  slave  at  his  or 
her  full  cash  value  and  give  to  the  applicant  an  order 
on  the  treasury  for  the  amount  and  also  to  such  slave 
a  certificate  of  freedom. 

"  SEC.  5.  That  the  municipal  authorities  of  Washing- 
ton and  Georgetown  within  their  respective  jurisdic- 
tional  limits,  are  hereby  empowered  and  required  to 
provide  active  and  efficient  means  to  assert  and  deliver 
up  to  their  owners  all  fugitive  slaves  escaping  into  said 
District. 

"  SEC.  6.  That  the  election  officers  within  said  District 
of  Columbia  are  hereby  empowered  and  required  to 
open  polls  at  all  the  usual  places  of  holding  elections 
on  the  first  Monday  of  April  next  and  receive  the  vote 
of  every  free  white  male  citizen  above  the  age  of  twen- 
ty-one years,  having  resided  within  said  district  for  the 
period  of  one  year  or  more  next  preceding  the  time  of 
such  voting  for  or  against  this  act,  to  proceed  in  taking 
said  votes  in  all  respects  herein  not  specified,  as  at  elec- 
tions under  the  municipal  laws,  and  with  as  little  delay 
as  possible  to  transmit  correct  statements  of  the  votes 
so  cast  to  the  President  of  the  United  States  ;  and  it 


60  LIFE     AND     SPEECH  ESOF 

shall  be  the  duty  of  the  President  to  canvass  said  votes 
immediately  and  if  a  majority  of  them  be  found  to  be 
for  this  act  to  forthwith  issue  his  proclamation,  giving 
notice  of  the  fact,  and  this  act  shall  only  be  in  full 
force  and  effect  on  and  after  the  day  of  such  procla- 
mation. 

"  SEC.  7.  That  involuntary  servitude  for  the  punish- 
ment of  crime,  whereof  the  party  shall  have  been  duly 
convicted,  shall  in  nowise  be  prohibited  by  this  act. 

"  SEC.  8.  That  for  all  the  purposes  of  this  act  the 
jurisdictional  limits  of  Washington  are  extended  to  all 
parts  of  the  District  of  Columbia  not  now  included 
within  the  present  limits  of  Georgetown." 

This  bill  shows  us  the  real  position  of  Mr.  Lincoln 
on  the  slavery  question,  in  1849.  He  was  opposed  to 
the  institution,  to  its  extension  into  the  territories,  and 
was  in  favor  of  its  abolition  in  the  District  of  Colum- 
bia, but  with  compensation  to  the  owner.  He  wras  for 
reform,  but  was  a  cautious,  conservative  reformer. 

On  the  31st  of  January,  Mr.  Edwards,  of  the  Com- 
mittee on  the  District  of  Columbia,  reported  a  bill  to 
prohibit  the  introduction  of  slaves  into  the  District  of 
Columbia  as  merchandise,  or  for  sale  or  hire.  After  it 
was  read  twice  a  motion  was  made  to  lay  it  on  the 
table,  which  motion  was  lost,  Mr.  Lincoln  again  vot- 
ing no. 

On  the  21st  of  February,  a  test  vote  was  taken  in  the 
House  on  a  bill  to  abolish  the  franking  privilege.  The 
motion  was  made  to  lay  the  bill  on  the  table.  Mr. 
Lincoln  voted  with  the  friends  of  the  bill,  who  saved 
it  from  immediate  defeat. 

The  reader  will  easily  discover  Mr.  Lincoln's  position 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN.  61 

in  Congress  upon  the  more  important  subjects  before  it 
in  this  record.  On  the  slavery  question  he  was  always 
true  to  his  principles,  ever  voting  against  the  extension 
of  slavery,  and  on  the  Mexican  war  occupying  the 
ground  of  the  Whigs  of  that  day  ;  refusing  to  justify 
the  war  itself,  but  voting  the  supplies  for  it,  that  the 
war  debt  might  be  liquidated. 

He  steadily  and  earnestly  opposed  the  annexation  of 
Texas,  and  labored  with  all  his  powers  in  behalf  of  the 
Wilmot  Proviso. 

TEN    YEAES    AT    HOME. 

Iii  the  National  Convention  of  1848,  of  which  he  was 
a  member,  he  advocated  the  nomination  of  General 
Taylor,  and  sustained  the  nomination  by  an  active  can- 
vass in  Illinois  and  Indiana. 

From  1849  to  1854  Mr.  Lincoln  was  engaged  assidu- 
ously in  the  practice  of  his  profession,  and  being  deeply 
immersed  in  business,  was  beginning  to  lose  his  interest 
in  politics,  when  the  scheming  ambition  and  grovelling 
selfishness  of  an  unscrupulous  aspirant  to  the  Presi- 
dency brought  about  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Com- 
promise. That  act  of  baseness  and  perfidy  aroused 
him,  and  he  prepared  for  new  efforts.  He  threw  him- 
self at  once  into  the  contest  that  followed,  and  fought 
the  battle  of  freedom  on  the  ground  of  his  former  con- 
flicts in  Illinois  with  more  than  his  accustomed  energy 
and  zeal.  Those  who  recollect  the  tremendous  battle 
fought  in  Illinois  that  year,  will  award  to  Abraham 
Lincoln  fully  three  fourths  of  the  ability  and  unweary- 
ing labor  which  resulted  in  the  mighty  victory  which 
gave  Illinois  her  first  Republican  Legislature,  and 


62  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES    OF 

placed  Lyman  Trambull  in  the  Senate  of  the  United 
States. 

The  Chicago  Tribune,  the  editor  of  which  is  a  per- 
sonal friend  of  Mr.  Lincoln,  and  from  whom  we  gather 
many  of  the  facts  of  the  early  life  of  the  subject  of  this 
volume,  gives  the  following  graphic  sketches  of  the 
Illinois  Campaign  of  1854  : 

"  The  first  and  greatest  debate  of  that  year  came  off 
between  Lincoln  and  Douglas  at  Springfield,  during  the 
progress  of  the  State  Fair,  in  October.  We  remember 
the  event  as  vividly  as  though  it  transpired  yesterday, 
and  in  view  of  the  prominence  now  given  to  the  chief 
actor  in  that  exciting  event,  it  cannot  fail  to  be  in- 
teresting to  all. 

"  The  affair  came  off  on  the  fourth  day  of  October, 
1854.  The  State  Fair  had  been  in  progress  two  days, 
and  the  capital  was  full  of  all  manner  of  men.  The 
Nebraska  bill  had  been  passed  on  the  previous  twenty- 
second  of  May.  Mr.  Douglas  had  returned  to  Illinois 
to  meet  an  outraged  constituency.  He  had  made  a 
fragmentary  speech  in  Chicago,  the  people  filling  up 
each  hiatus  in  a  peculiar  and  good-humored  way.  He 
called  the  people  a  mob — they  called  him  a  rowdy. 
The  '  mob '  had  the  best  of  it,  both  then  and  at  the 
election  which  succeeded.  The  notoriety  of  all  these 
events  had  stirred  up  the  politics  of  the  State  from 
bottom  to  top.  Hundreds  of  politicians  had  met  at 
Springfield,  expecting  a  tournament  of  an  unusual 
character — Douglas,  Breese,  Kcerner,  Lincoln,  Trum- 
bull,  Matteson,  Yates,  Codding,  John  Calhoun  (of  the 
order  of  the  candle-box),  John  M.  Palmer,  the  whole 
house  of  the  McConnells,  Singleton  (known  to  fame 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  63 

in  the  Mormon  war),  Thomas  L.  Harris,  and  a  host  oi 
others.  Several  speeches  were  made  before,  and  several 
after,  the  passage  between  Lincoln  and  Douglas,  but 
that  was  justly  held  to  be  the  event  of  the  season. 

"  We  do  not  remember  whether  a  challenge  to  de- 
bate passed  between  the  friends  of  the  speakers  or  not, 
but  there  was  a  perfectly  amicable  understanding  be- 
tween Lincoln  and  Douglas,  that  the  former  should 
speak  two  or  three  hours,  and  the  latter  reply  in  just 
as  little  or  as  much  time  as  he  chose.  Mr.  Lincoln 
took  the  stand  at  two  o'clock — a  large  crowd'in  atten- 
dance, and  Mr.  Douglas  seated  on  a  small  platform  in 
front  of  the  desk.  The  first  half-hour  of  Mr.  Lincoln's 
speech  was  taken  up  with  compliments  to  his  distin- 
guished friend  Judge  Douglas,  and  dry  allusions  to  the 
political  events  of  the  past  few  years.  His  distin- 
guished friend,  Judge  Douglas,  "had  taken  his  seat,  as 
solemn  as  the  Cock-Lane  ghost,  evidently  with  the  de- 
sign of  not  moving  a  muscle  till  it  came  his  turn  to 
speak.  The  laughter  provoked  by  Lincoln's  exordium, 
however,  soon  began  to  make  him  uneasy  ;  and  when 
Mr.  L.  arrived  at  his  (Douglas')  speech,  pronouncing 
the  Missouri  Compromise  'a  sacred  thing,  which  no 
ruthless  hand  would  ever  be  reckless  enough  to  disturb/ 
he  opened  his  lips  far  enough  to  remark,  l  A  first-rate 
speech!'  This  was  the  beginning  of  an  amusing  col- 
loquy. 

"  '  Yes,'  continued  Mr.  Lincoln,  '  so  affectionate  was 
my  friend's  regard  for  this  compromise  line,  that  when 
Texas  was  admitted  into  the  Union,  and  it  was  found 
that  a  strip  extended  north  of  36°  30'  he  actually  in- 


64  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

troduced  a  bill  extending  the  line  and  prohibiting  sla- 
very in  the  northern  edge  of  the  new  State/ 

"  l  And  you  voted  against  the  bill/  said  Douglas. 

"  '  Precisely  so/  replied  Lincoln;  '  I  was  in  favor  of 
running  the  line  a  great  deal  farther  South.' 

"  '  About  this  time/  the  speaker  continued,  '  my 
distinguished  friend  introduced  me  to  a  particular 
friend  of  his,  one  David  Wihnot  of  Pennsylvania/ 
(Laughter.) 

. "  *  I  thought/  said  Douglas,  '  you  would  find  him 
congenial  company/ 

"  '  So  I  did/  replied  Lincoln.  1 1  had  the  pleasure  of 
voting  for  his  Proviso,  in  one  way  and  another  about 
forty  times.  It  was  a  Democratic  measure  then,  I  be- 
lieve. At  any  rate,  General  Case  scolded  Honest 
John  Davis,  of  Massachusetts,  soundly,  for  taking 
away  the  last  hours  of  the  session  so  that  he  (Cass) 
couldn't  crowd  it  through.  Apropos  of  General  Cass  : 
if  I  am  not  greatly  mistaken,  he  has  a  prior  claim  to 
my  distinguished  friend,  to  the  authorship  of  Popular 
Sovereignty.  The  old  general  has  an  infirmity  for 
writing  letters.  Shortly  after  the  scolding  he  gave 
John  Davis,  he  wrote  his  Nicholson  letter — ' 

"  Douglas  (solemnly) — '  God  Almighty  placed  man 
on  the  earth,  and  told  him  to  choose  between  good  and 
evil.  That  was  the  origin  of  the  Nebraska  bill !' 

"  Lincoln — •'  Well,  the  priority  of  invention  being 
settled,  let  us  award  all  credit  to  Judge  Douglas  for 
being  the  first  to  discover  it/ 

"  It  would  be  impossible,  in  these  limits,  to  give  an 
idea  of  the  strength  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  argument.  We 
deemed  it  by  far  the  ablest  effort  of  the  campaign — from 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  65 

whatever  source.  The  occasion  was  a  great  one,  and 
the  speaker  was  every  way  equal  to  it.  The  effect  pro- 
duced on  the  listeners  was  magnetic.  No  one  who  was 
present  will  ever  forget  the  power  and  vehemence  of 
the  following  passage  : 

"  '  My  distinguished  friend  says  it  is  an  insult  to  the 
emigrants  to  Kansas  and  Nebraska  to  suppose  they 
are  not  able  to  govern  themselves.  We  must  not  slur 
over  an  argument  of  this  kind  because  it  happens  to 
tickle  the  ear.  It  must  be  met  and  answered.  I  ad- 
mit that  the  emigrant  to  Kansas  and  Nebraska  is  com- 
petent to  govern  himself,  but/  the  speaker  rising  to  his 
full  height,  1 1  deny  his  right  to  govern  any  other  person 

WITHOUT     THAT   PERSON'S     CONSENT.'      The     applause 

which  followed  this  triumphant  refutation  of  a  cunning 
falsehood,  was  but  an  earnest  of  the  victory  at  the 
polls  which  followed  just  one  month  from  that  day. 

"  When  Mr.  Lincoln  had  concluded,  Mr.  Douglas 
strode  hastily  to  the  stand.  As  usual,  he  employed 
ten  minutes  in  telling  how  grossly  he  had  been  abused. 
Eecollecting  himself,  he  added,  '  though  in  a  perfectly 
courteous  manner ' — abused  in  a  perfectly  courteous 
manner!  He  then  devoted  half  an  hour  to  showing 
that  it  was  indispensably  necessary  to  California  emi- 
grants, Sante  Fe  traders  and  others,  to  have  organic 
acts  provided  for  the  territories  of  Kansas  and  Ne- 
braska— that  being  precisely  the  point  which  nobody 
disputed.  Having  established  this  premiss  to  his  satis- 
faction, Mr.  Douglas  launched  forth  into  an  argument 
wholly  apart  from  the  positions  taken  by  Mr.  Lincoln. 
He  had  about  half  finished  at  six  o'clock,  when  an  ad- 
journment to  tea  was  effected.  The  speaker  insisted 


66  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

strenuously  upon  his  right  to  resume  in  the"  evening, 
but  we  believe  the  second  part  of  that  speech  has  not 
been  delivered  to  this  day.  After  the  Springfield  pas- 
sage, the  two  speakers  went  to  Peoria,  and  tried  it 
again,  with  identically  the  same  results.  A  friend, 
who  listened  to  the  Peoria  debate,  informed  us  that 
after  Lincoln  had  finished,  Dou§las  'hadn't  much  to 
say .' — which  we  presume  to  have  been  Mr.  Douglas' 
view  of  the  case  also,  for  the  reason  that  he  ran  away 
from  his  antagonist  and  kept  out  of  the  way  during 
the  remainder  of  the  campaign. 

"  During  this  exciting  campaign  Mr.' Lincoln  pressed 
the  slavery  issue  upon  the  people  of  Central  and  South- 
ern Illinois,  who  were  largely  made  up  of  the  emigra- 
tion from  Kentucky,  Tennessee,  Virginia,  and  North 
Carolina,  with  all  the  powers  of  his  mind.  He  felt  the 
force  of  the  moral  causes  that  must  influence  the  ques- 
tion, and  he  'never  failed  to  appeal  to  the  moral  senti- 
ment of  the  people  in  aid  of  the  argument  drawn  from 
political  sources,  and  to  illuminate  his  theme  with  the 
lofty  inspirations  of  an  eloquence,  pleading  for  the 
rights  of  humanity.  A  revolution  swept  the  State. 
For  the  first  time  a  majority  of  the  Legislature  of  Illi- 
nois was  opposed  to  the  Democratic  administration  of 
the  federal  government.  A  United  States  Senator 
was  to  be  elected  in  place  of  General  Shields  who  had 
yielded  to  the  influence  of  his  less  scrupulous  colleague, 
and,  against  his  own  better  judgment,  had  voted  for  the 
Kansas-Nebraska  act.  The  election  came  on,  and  a 
number  of  ballots  were  taken,  the  almost  united  oppo- 
sition voting  steadily  for  Lincoln,  but  the  anti-Nebras- 
ka Democrats  for  Trumbull.  Mr.  Lincoln  became  ap- 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  67 

prehensive  that  those  men  who  had  been  elected  as 
Democrats,  though  opposed  to  Judge  Douglas,  would 
turn  upon  some  third  candidate,  of  less  decided  convic- 
tions than  Judge  Trumhull,  and  possibly  elect  a  Sena- 
tor who  had  little  or  nothing  in  common  with  the  then, 
inchoate  Republican  party.  To  prevent  such  a  con- 
summation, he  went^ersonally  to  his  friends,  and  by 
strong  persuasion,  induced  them  to  vote  for  Trumbull. 

"  He  thus  secured,  by  an  act  of  generous  self-sacri- 
fice, a  triumph  for  the  cause  of  right,  and  an  advocate 
of  it  on  the  floor  of  the  Senate,  not  inferior,  in  earnest 
zeal  for  the  principles  of  Republicanism,  to  any  mem- 
ber of  that  body. 

"  Some  of  his  friends  on  the  floor  of  the  Legislature 
wept  like  children  when  constrained  by  Mr.  Lincoln's 
personal  appeals  to  desert  him  and  unite  on  Trumbull. 
It  is  proper  to  say  in  this  connection,  that  between 
Trumbull  and  Lincoln  the  most  cordial  relations  have 
always  existed,  and  that  the  feeling  of  envy  or  rivalry 
is  not  to  be  found  in  the  breast  of  either." 

At  the  Peoria  debate  alluded  to  above,  the  arrange- 
ment was  that  Douglas  should  speak  as  long  as  he 
pleased,  then  that  Lincoln  should  do  the  same,-  and  that 
Douglas  should  have  an  hour  to  close.  Douglas  com- 
menced at  2  o'clock  and  spoke  till  six,  wearing  away 
the  time  in  a  tedious  speech,  hoping  that  the  farmers, 
who  had  come  in  from  the  country,  would  not  stay  to 
hear  Mr,  Lincoln's  reply.  As  soon  as  Douglas  had 
concluded  his  speech,  the  vast  crowd  who  had  patiently 
listened  to  him  divided,  the  Democrats  at  once  leaving 
in  great  numbers  for  the  country,  while  the  Whigs  and 
Free-Soilers  remained  and  loudly  called  for  Lincoln. 


68  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

Mr.  L.,  nothing  vexed  by  the  consumption  by  Douglas 
of  the  whole  afternoon,  when  no  one  expected  that  he 
would  occupy  more  than  an  hour  and  a  half  or  two 
hours,  proposed  that  the  crowd  adjourn  for  tea,  which 
they  very  reluctantly  did.  After  half  an  hour  the  crowd 
again  assembled,  and  Mr.  Lincoln  took  the  stand,  and 
for  three  hours  continued  to  entrance  his  hearers  by  ir- 
resistible logic  and  strains  of  eloquence  never  before  ex- 
celled in  any  of  his  public  efforts.  The  whole  territo- 
rial history  of  the  country  was  reviewed,  and  the  Kan- 
sas-Nebraska bill,  then  recently  passed,  was  dissected 
in  a  manner  such  as  has  never  been  surpassed  in  the 
halls  of  Congress.  Never  since,  in  all  the  discus- 
sions, innumerable  and  interminable,  of  that  subject  in 
the  intervening  six  years,  have  the  inconsistencies  of 
Judge  Douglas  been  shown  up  as  they  were  then,  but 
all  in  the  utmost  good  nature.  Since  then  Douglas  has 
invented  new  subterfuges,  but  before  that  audience,  all 
his  political  tricks  and  dodges  in  connection  with  that 
bill  were  thoroughly  exposed. 

About  half-past  nine,  Douglas  rose  to  take  his  hour. 
It  was  evident  he  had  no  heart  for  the  undertaking. 
He  beat  a  most  handsome  retreat.  He  complained  of 
his  voice,  which  he  said  would  not  permit  of  his  oc- 
cupying his  hour  ;  he  complimented  the  city  of  Peoritv 
— the  intelligence  of  its  citizens,  and  the  natural  beaut^ 
of  its  location,  which,  of  course,  brought  down  cheers 
for  him  ;  he  complimented  Lincoln  ;  he  spoke  of  the 
fact  that  in  the  cemetery  adjacent  to  the  city  rested 
the  remains  of  the  lamented  Governor  Ford — in  short, 
he  devoted  a  quarter  of  an  hour  to  putting  the  au- 
dience in  good  humor  with  him,  and  then,  without  at- 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  69 

tempting  a  reply  to  his  antagonist's  crushing  argu- 
ments, bid  his  audience  good  night. 

Mr.  Lincoln  expected  to  meet  Mr.  Douglas  next  at 
Lacon,  or  Henry,  north  of  Peoria,  on  the  Illinois 
river  ;  but  the  "  Little  Giant"  had  had  enough  of 
"  Old  Abe"  that  year,  and  did'  not  give  the  latter  an- 
other opportunity  of  meeting  him  during  the  season. 

Mr.  Lincoln  was  offered  the  nomination  for  Gover- 
nor by  the  Anti-Nebraska  (the  future  Kepublican) 
party  in  1854  ;  but  he  told  his  friends,  "  No — I  am 
not  the  man  ;  Bissell  will  make  a  better  Governor 
than  I,  and  you  can  elect  him  on  account  of  his  Demo- 
cratic antecedents."  So,  giving  to  Bissell  the  flag  it 
was  universally  desired  that  he  should  bear,  he  himself 
took  the  sword,  and  hewed  a  way  for  the  triumph  of 
that  year. 


70  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 


PAR  T    T  HIRD. 

THE  GREAT  SENATORIAL  CONTEST. 

IN  the  summer  of  1858,  the  great  Senatorial  contest 
of  Illinois  took  place  between  Mr.  Douglas  on  the  one 
hand,  and  Mr.  Lincoln  on  the  other.  The  rebellion  of 
Mr.  Douglas  in  the  U.  S.  Senate  against  the  adminis- 
tration— his  refusal  to  assist  in  the  perpetration  of  the 
Lecompton  fraud,  insure^  him  the  enmity  of  the  ad- 
ministration ;  but  in  spite  of  this,  his  position  gave 
him  immense  strength  both  in  and  outside  of  Illinois. 
Prominent  Republicans  in  other  States  were  disposed 
to  see  him  returned  to  the  Senate  as  a  rebuke  to  the 
administration,  vainly  hoping  that  Mr.  D.  would  aban- 
don the  Democratic  party.  Mr.  Crittenden  wrote  a 
letter  advising  the  Americans  or  old  Whigs  of  Illinois 
to  vote  for  Douglas,  and  in  consequence  of  this  outside 
pressure  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  Mr.  Douglas  was 
stronger  by  ten  thousand  votes  as  a  rebel,  than  he 
would  have  been  as  an  administration  favorite. 

All  who  know  anything  at  all  of  Mr.  Douglas  are 
aware  that  as  a  political  debater,  either  on  the  stump 
or  on  the  Senate  floor,  he  has  no  superior,  if  he  has  an 
equal,  in  the  country.  It  was,  then,  no  light  matter 
to  contest  the  State  of  Illinois  with  such  a  man  as, Mr. 
Douglas,  and  especially  under  the  circumstances,  when 
the  masses  of  the  people  sympathized  with  Mr.  D.  in 
his  quarrel  with  the  administration. 


.ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  71 

A  Republican  State  Convention  met  at  Springfield, 
Illinois,  June  2,  1858,  and  put  Mr.  Lincoln  in  nomina- 
tion as  the  Republican  candidate  for  United  States 
Senator.  The  Convention  also  adopted  the  subjoined 
platform  : 

THE    ILLINOIS   PLATFOKM. 

"  We,  the  Republicans  of  Illinois,  in  Convention 
assembled,  in  addition  to  our  previous  affirmations, 
make  the  following  declaration  of  our  principles  : 

"  1.  We  reaffirm  our  devotion  to  the  Constitution  of 
the  country,  and  to  the  union  of  the  States,  and  will 
steadily  resist  all  attempts  for  the  perversion  of  the  one 
and  the  disruption  of  the  other.  We  recognize  the 
equal  rights  of  all  the  States,  and  avow  our  readiness 
and  willingness  -  to  maintain  them;  and  disclaim  all 
intention  of  attempting,  either  directly  or  indirectly, 
to  assail  or  abridge  the  rights  of  any  of  the  members  of- 
the  confederacy  guaranteed  by  the  Constitution,  or  in 
any  manner  to  interfere  with  the  institution  of  slavery 
in  the  States  where  it  exists.  Nevertheless,  we  hold 
that  the  government  was  instituted  for  freemen,  and 
that  it  can  be  perpetuated,  and  made  to  fulfil  the  pur- 
poses of  its  organization  only  by  devoting  itself  to  the 
promotion  of  virtue  and  intelligence  among  its  citizens, 
and  the  advancement  of  their  prosperity  and  happiness  ; 
and  to  these  ends,  we  hold  it  to  be  the  duty  of  the  gov- 
ernment so  to  reform  the  system  of  disposing  of  the 
public  lands  as  to  secure  the  soil  to  actual  settlers,  and 
wrest  it  from  the  grasp  of  men  who  speculate  in  the 
homes  of  the  people,  and  from  corporations  that  lock 
it  up  in  dead  hands  for  enhanced  profits. 

"  2.  Free  labor  being  the  only  true  support  of  repub- 
lican institutions,  our  government  should  maintain  its 
rights  ;  and  we  therefore  demand  the  improvement  of 
our  harbors  and  rivers  whicli  freight  the  commerce  of 
the  West  to  a  market,  and  the  construction  of  a  central 


72  LIFE     AND    SPEECHES    OF 

highway,  to  connect  our  trade  with  the  Pacific  States, 
as  rightful  encouragement  to  home  industry  ;  and,  in- 
asmuch as  we  now  compete  in  the  markets  of  the  whole 
country  against  the  products  of  unpaid  labor,  at  depre- 
ciating prices,  it  is  therefore  eminently  unjust  that  the 
National  Administration  should  attempt,  by  coercion, 
to  extend  a  servile  system  in  the  territories,  or,  by  pa- 
tronage, to  perpetuate  slavery  in  the  States. 

"  3.  The  present  administration  has  proved  recreant 
to  the  trusts  committed  to  its  hands,  and  by  its  extra- 
ordinary, corrupt,  unjust,  and  undignified,  exertions, 
to  give  effect  to  the  original  intention  and  purpose  of 
the  Kansas-Nebraska  bill,  by  forcing  upon  the  people 
of  Kansas,  against  their  will,  and  in  defiance  of  their 
known  and  earnestly-expressed  wishes,  a  constitution 
recognizing  slavery  as  one  of  their  domestic  institutions, 
it  has  forfeited  all  claim  to  the  support  of  the  friends 
of  free  men,  free  labor,  and  equal  rights. 

"  4.  It  is  the  duty  of  the  government  faithfully  and 
diligently  to  execute  all  our  treaty  stipulations,  and  to 
enforce  all  our  laws  for  the  suppression  of  the  slave- 
trade. 

"  5.  While  we  deprecate  all  interference  on  the 
part  of  political  organizations  with  the  action  of  the 
Judiciary,  if  such  action  is  limited  to  its  appropriate 
sphere,  yet  we  cannot  refrain  from  expressing  our  con- 
demnation of  the  principles  and  tendencies  of  the  extra 
judicial  opinions  of  a  majority  of  the  Judges  of  the 
Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States,  in  the  matter  of 
Dred  Scott,  wherein  the  political  heresy  is  put  forth, 
that  the  Federal  Constitution  extends  slavery  into  all 
the  territories  of  the  Republic,  and  so  maintains  it  that 
neither  Congress  nor  people,  through  their  territorial 
legislature,  can  by  law  abolish  it.  We  hold  that  Con- 
gress possesses  sovereign  power  over  the  territories 
while  they  remain  in  a  territorial  condition  ;  and  that 
it  is  the  duty  of  the  general  government  to  protect  the 
territories  from  the  curse  of  slavery,  and  to  preserve 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  73 

the  public  domain  for  the  occupation  of  free  men  and 
free  labor.  And  we  declare  that  no  power  on  earth  can 
carry  and  maintain  slavery  in 'the  States  against  the 
will  of  the  people  and  the  provisions  of  their  constitu- 
tions and  laws  ;  and  we  fully  endorse  the  recent  decis- 
ion of  the  Supreme  Court  of  our  own  State,  Vhich 
declares,  "  that  property  in  persons  is  repugnant  to  the 
constitution  and  laws  of  Illinois,  arid  that  all  persons 
within  its  jurisdiction  are  supposed  to  be  free  ;  and 
that  slavery,  where  it  exists,  is  a  municipal  regulation, 
without  any  extra-territorial  operation. 

11  6.  The  policy  of  this  government  should  be,  to  live 
on  terms  of  peace  and  amity  with  all  the  nations  of  the 
earth,  so  far  as  it  can  be  done  consistently  with  our 
national  honor  and  interest,  and  to  enter  into  entang- 
ling alliances  with  none. .  Our  intercourse  with  other 
nations  should  be  conducted  upon  principles  of  exact 
and  exalted  justice  ;  and  while  firmly  maintaining  our 
own  rights,  we  should  carefully  avoid  any  invasion  of 
the  rights  of  others,  and  especially  those  of  weaker  na- 
tions. Our  commerce  ought  to  be  protected  from  wan- 
ton interruption,  and  our  commercial  marine  from 
invasion  and  search  ;  and  while  we  would  deplore  the 
necessity  of  war  with  any  of  the  nations  of  the  earth, 
we  will  still  firmly,  zealously,  and  patriotically,  sustain 
the  government  in  any  just  measures  which  it  may  so 
adopt,  to  obtain  redress  for  indignities  which  may  here- 
tofore have  been  inflicted  upon  our  citizens  navigating 
the  seas,  or  which  may  be  necessary  to  secure  them 
against  a  repetition  of  like  injuries  in  the  future. 

"  7.  We  view,  with  regret  and  alarm,  the  rapidly- 
increasing  expenditures  of  the  general  government, 
which  now,  in  a  state  of  profound  peace,  threaten  the 
country  with  national  bankruptcy  ;  and  we  pledge  our- 
selves, so  far  as  we  speak  for  the  Republicans  of  Illinois, 
to  a  thorough  and  radical  reform  in  the  administration 
of  the  government  finances,  in  the  event  that  the  Repub- 
licans are  intrusted  with  the  care  of  national  affairs." 


74  LIFE    AND     SPEECHES    OF 

Mr.  Lincoln  delivered  an  able  speech  to  the  Conven- 
tion, which  might  be  said  to  open  the  campaign. 

On  the  24th  of  July,'  Mr.  Lincoln  initiated  the  cor- 
respondence which  follows,  by  sending  the  letter  which 
is  the  first  of  the  series  : 

DOUGLAS   AND   LINCOLN    CORRESPONDENCE. 
Mr.  Lincoln  to  Mr.  Douglas. 

CHICAGO,  ILL.,  July  24,  1858. 
Hon.  S.  A.  DOUGLAS  : 

My  Dear  Sir — Will  it  be  agreeable  to  you  to  make 
an  arrangement  for  you  and  myself  to  divide  time,  and 
address  the  same  audiences  the  present  canvass  ?  Mr. 
Judd,  who  will  hand  you  this,  is  authorized  to  receive 
your  answer  ;  and,  if  agreeable  to  you,  to  enter  into 
the  terms  of  such  arrangement. 

Your  obedient  servant, 

A.  LINCOLN. 

Mr.  Douglas  to  Mr.  Lincoln. 

CHICAGO,  July  24,  1808. 
Hon.  A.  LINCOLN  : 

Dear  Sir — Your  note  of  this  date,  in  which  you  in- 
quire if  it  would  be  agreeable  to  me  to  make  an 
arrangement  to  divide  the  time  and  address  the  same 
audiences  during  the  present  canvass,  was  handed  me 
by  Mr.  Judd.  Kecent  events  have  interposed  difficul- 
ties in  the  way  of  such  an  arrangement . 

I  went  to  Springfield  last  week  for  the  purpose  of 
conferring  with  the  Democratic  State  Central  Com- 
mittee upon  the  mode  of  conducting  the  canvass,  and 
with  them,  and  under  their  advice,  made  a  list  of  ap- 
pointments covering  the  entire  period  until  late  in  Oc- 
tober. The  people  of  the  several  localities  have  been 
notified  of  the  times  and  places  of  the  meetings.  These 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  75 

appointments  have  all  been  made  for  Democratic  meet- 
ings, and  arrangements  have  been  made  by  which  the 
Democratic  candidates  for  Congress,  for  the  Legisla- 
ture, and  other  offices,  will  be  present  and  address  the 
people.  It  is  evident,  therefore,  that  these  various 
candidates,  in  connection  with  myself,  will  occupy  the 
whole  time  of  the  day  and  evening,  and  leave  no  oppor- 
tunity for  other  speeches. 

Besides,  there  is  another  consideration  which  should 
be  kept  in  mind.  It  has  been  suggested,  recently,  that 
an  arrangement  had  been  made  to  bring  out  a  third 
candidate  for  the  United  States  Senate,  who,  with 
yourself,  should  canvass  the  State  in  opposition  to  me, 
with  no  other  purpose  than  to  insure  my  defeat,  by  di- 
viding the  Democratic  party  for  your  benefit.  If  I 
should  make  this  arrangement  with  you,  it  is  more 
than  probable  that  this  other  candidate,  who  has  a 
common  object  with  you,  would  desire  to  become  a 
party  to  it,  and  claim  the  right  to  speak  from  the  same 
stand  ;  so  that  he  and  you,  in  concert,  might  be  able 
to  take  the  opening  and  closing  speech  in  every  case. 

I  cannot  refrain  from  expressing  my  surprise,  if  it 
was  your  original  intention  to  invite  such  an  arrange- 
ment, that  you  should  have  waited  until  after  I  had 
made  my  appointments,  inasmuch  as  we  were  both  here 
in  Chicago  together  for  several  days  after  my  arrival, 
and  again  at  Bloomington,  Atlanta,  Lincoln,  and 
Springfield,  where  it  was  well  known  I  went  for  the 
purpose  of  consulting  with  the  State  Central  Com- 
mittee, and  agreeing  upon  the  plan  of  the  campaign. 

While,  under  these  circumstances,  I  do  not  feel  at 
liberty  to  make  any  arrangements  which  would  deprive 
the  Democratic  candidates  for  Congress,  State  officers, 
and  the  Legislature,  from  participating  in  the  discus- 
sion at  the  various  meetings  designated  by  the  Demo- 
cratic State  Central  Committee,  I  will,  in  order  to  ac- 
commodate you,  as  far  as  it  is  in  iny  power  to  do  so, 
take  the  responsibility  of  making  an  arrangement  with 


76  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

you  for  a  discussion  between  us  at  one  prominent  point 
in  each  Congressional  District  in  the  State,  except  the 
second  and  sixth  districts,  where  we  have  both  spoken, 
and  in  each  of  which  cases  you  had  the  concluding 
speech.  If  agreeable  to  you,  I  will  indicate  the  fol- 
lowing places  as  those  most  suitable  in  the  several  Con- 
gressional Districts,  at  which  we  should  speak,  to  wit : 
Freeport,  Ottawa,  Galesburgh,  Quincy,  Alton,  Jones- 
boro',  and  Charleston.  I  will  confer  with  you  at  the 
earliest  convenient  opportunity  in  regard  to  the  mode 
of  conducting  the  debate,  the  times  of  meeting  at  the 
several  places,  subject  to  the  condition,  that  where  ap- 
pointments have  already  been  made  by  the  Democratic 
State  Central  Committee  at  any  of  those  places,  I  must 
insist  upon  your  meeting  me  at  the  time  specified. 
Very  respectfully. 

Your  most  obedient  servant, 
S.  A.  DOUGLAS. 

Mr.  Lincoln  to  Mr.  Douglas. 

SPRINGFIELD,  July  29,  1858. 
Hon.  S.  A.  DOUGLAS  : 

Dear  Sir — Yours  of  the  24th,  in  relation  to  an 
arrangement  to  divide  time,  and  address  the  same  au- 
diences, is  received  ;  and,  in  apology  for  not  sooner  re- 
plying, allow  me  to  say,  that  when  I  sat  by  you  at 
dinner  yesterday,  I  was  not  aware  that  you  had  an- 
swered my  note,  nor,  certainly,  that  my  own  note  had 
been  presented  to  you.  An  hou'r  after,  I  saw  a  copy  of 
your  answer  in  the  Chicago  Times,  and,  reaching  home, 
I  found  the  original  awaiting  me.  Protesting  that 
your  insinuations  of  attempted  unfairness  on  my  part 
are  unjust,  and  with  the  hope  that  you  did  not  very 
considerately  make  them,  I  proceed  to  reply.  To  your 
statement  that  "  It  has  been  suggested,  recently,  that  an 
arrangement  had  been  made  to  bring  out  a  third  candi- 
date for  the  U.  S.  Senate,  who,  with  yourself,  should 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  77 

canvass  the  State  in  opposition  to  me,"  etc.,  I  can  only 
say,  that  such  suggestion  must  have  been  made  by 
yourself,  for  certainly  none  such  has  been  made  by  or 
to  me,  or  otherwise,  to  my  knowledge.  Surely  you  did 
not  deliberately  conclude,  as  you  insinuate,  that  I  was 
expecting  to  draw  you  into  an  arrangement  of  terms, 
to  be  agreed  on  by  yourself,  by  which  a  third  candidate 
and  myself,  "  in  concert,  might  be  able  to  take  the  open- 
ing and  closing  speech  in  every  case." 

As  to  your  surprise  that  I  did  not  sooner  make  the 
proposal  to  divide  time  with  you,  I  can  only  say,  I  made 
it  as  soon  as  I  resolved  to  make  it.  I  did  not'know  but 
that  such  proposal  would  come  from  you  ;  I  waited, 
respectfully,  to  see.  It  may  have"  been  well  known  to 
you  that  you  went  to  Springfield  for  the  purpose  of 
agreeing  on  the  plan  of  campaign  ;  but  it  was  not  so 
known  to  me.  When  your  appointments  were  an- 
nounced in  the  papers,  extending  only  to  the  21st  of 
August,  I,  for  the  first  time,  considered  it  certain  that 
you  would  make  no  proposal  to  me,  and  then  resolved 
that,  if  mjfc  friends  concurred,  I  would  make  one  to 
you.  As  soon  thereafter  as  I  could  see  and  consult 
with  friends  satisfactorily,  I  did  make  the  proposal.  It 
did  not  occur  to  me  that  the  proposed  arrangement 
could  derange  your  plans  after  the  latest  of  your  ap- 
pointments already  made.  After  that,  there  was,  before 
the  election,  largely  over  two  months  of  clear  time. 

For  you  to  say  that  we  have  already  spoken  at  Chi- 
cago and  Springfield,  and  that  on  both  occasions  I  had 
the  concluding  speech,  is  hardly  a  fair  statement.  The 
truth  rather  is  this  :  At  Chicago,  July  9th,  you  made 
a  carefully-prepared  conclusion  on  my  speech  of  June 
16th.  Twenty-four  hours  after,  I  made  a  hasty  conclu- 
sion on  yours  of  the  9th.  You  had  six  days  to  pre- 
pare, and  concluded  on  me  again  at  Bloomington  on 
the  16th.  Twenty-four  hours  after  I  concluded  again 
on  you  at  Springfield.  In  the  meantime,  you  had 
made  another  conclusion  on  me  at  Springfield,  which  I 


78  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

d?d  not  hear,  and  of  the  contents  of  which  I  knew 
nothing  when  I  spoke  ;  so  that  your  speech  made  in 
daylight,  and  mine  at  night,  on  the  17th,  at  Spring- 
field, were  both  made  in  perfect  independence  of  each 
other.  The  dates  of  making  all  these  speeches  will 
show,  I  think,  that  in  the  matter  of  time  for  prepara- 
tion, the  advantage  has  been  all  on  your  side  ;  and  that 
none  of  the  external  circumstances  has  stood  to  my 
advantage. 

I  agree  to  an  arrangement  for  us  to  speak  at  the 
seven  places  you  have  named,  and  at  your  own  times, 
provided  you  name  the  times  at  once,  so  that  I,  as  well 
as  you,  can  have  to  myself  the  time  not  covered  by  the 
arrangement.  As  to  the  other  details,  I  wish  perfect 
reciprocity,  and  no  more.  I  wish  as  much  time  as 
you,  and  that  conclusions  shall  alternate.  That  is  all. 

Your  obedient  servant, 

A.  LINCOLN. 
, 

P.  S.  As  matters  now  stand,  I  shall  be  at  no  more 
of  your  exclusive  meetings  ;  and  for  about*  week  from 
to-day  a  letter  from  you  will  reach  me  at  Springfield. 

A.  L. 

Mr.  Douglas  to  Mr.  Lincoln. 

BEMENT,  PIATT  Co.,  ILL.,  July  30,  1858. 

Dear  Sir — Your  letter,  dated  yesterday,  accepting 
my  proposition  for  a  joint  discussion  at  one  prominent 
point  in  each  Congressional  District,  as  stated  in  my 
previous  letter,  was  received  this  morning. 

The  times  and  places  designated  are  as  follows : 

Ottawa,  La  Salle  county August  21st,  1858. 

Freeport,  Stcphenson  county "  27th, 

Jonesboro,  Union   county September  15th, 

Charleston,  Coles  county "  18th, 

Galesburgh,  Knox  county October  7th, 

Quincy,  Adams  county "  13th, 

Alton,  Madison  county "  15th, 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  79 

I  agree  to  your  suggestion  that  we  shall  alternately 
open  and  close  the  discussion.  I  will  speak  at  Ottawa 
one  hour,  you  can  reply,  occupying  an  hour  and  a  half, 
and  I  will  then  follow  for  half  an  hour.  At  Freeport, 
you  shall  open  the  discussion  and  speak  one  hour,  I 
will  follow  for  an  hour  and  a  half,  and  you  can  then 
reply  for  half  an  hour.  We  will  alternate  in  like  man- 
ner at  each  successive  place. 

Very  respectfully,  your  obedient  servant, 

S.  A.  DOUGLAS. 

Hon.  A.  LINCOLN,  Springfield,  111. 

[Mr.  Lincoln  to  Mr.  Douglas.] 

SPRINGFIELD,  July  31,  1858. 

Hon.  S.  A.  DOUGLAS  :  Dear  Sir — Yours  of  yester- 
day, naming  places,  times,  and  terms,  for  joint  discus- 
sions between  us,  was  received  this  morning.  Although, 
by  the  terms,  as  you  propose,  you  take  four  openings 
and  closes,  to  my  three,  I  accede,  and  thus  close  the 
arrangement.  I  direct  this  to  you  at  Hillsboro,  and 
shall  try  to  have  both  your  letter  and  this  appear  in 
the  Journal  and  Register  of  Monday  morning. 

Your  obedient  servant, 

A.  LINCOLN. 

Of  the  joint  debates  which  followed  this  correspond- 
ence the  press  of  the  entire  country  has  spoken,  and  it 
is  the  highest  praise  of  Mr.  Lincoln  to  say,  as  the  press 
everywhere  said,  that  he  held  his  ground  in  every  en- 
counter with  Mr.  Douglas,  as  a  debater  and  as  an 
orator.  He  had  truth  on  his  side  to  be  sure,  which  is 
always  a  great  advantage,  but  neither  in  repartee  nor  in 
argument  did  Mr.  Douglas  for  once  confuse,  or  confute 
his  opponent.  An  Illinois  correspondent  of  a  Boston 
journal,  said  to  be  the  President  of  an  Illinois  College, 


80  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES    OF 

wrote,  after  witnessing  the  joint  debate  at  Galesburgh, 
as  follows  : 

"  The  men  are  entirely  dissimilar.  Mr.  Douglas  is  a 
thick-set,  finely-built,  courageous  man,  and  has  an  air 
of  self-confidence  that  does  not  a  little  to  inspire  his 
supporters  with  hope.  Mr.  Lincoln  is  a  tall,  lank  man, 
awkward,  apparently  diffident,  and  when  not  speaking 
has  neither  firmness  in  his  countenance  nor  fire  in  his 

ri-tr/}  *tr  V  *•«"  V 

"  Mr.  Lincoln  has  a  rich,  silvery  voice,  enunciates 
with  great  distinctness,  and  has  a  fine  command  of 
language.  He  commenced  by  a  review  of  the  points 
Mr.  Douglas  had  made.  In  this  he  showed  great  tact, 
and  his  retorts,  though  gentlemanly,  were  sharp,  and 
reached  to  the  core  the  subject  in  dispute.  While  he 
gave  but  little  time  to  the/ work  of  review,  we  did  not 
feel  that  anything  was  omitted  which  deserved  atten- 
tion. 

"  He  then  proceeded  to  defend  the  Republican  party. 
Here  he  charged  Mr.  Douglas  with  doing  nothing  for 
freedom  ;  with  disregarding  the  rights  and  interests  of 
the  colored  man  ;  and  for  about  forty  minutes  he  spoke 
with  a  power  that  we  have  seldom  heard  equalled. 
There  was  a  grandeur  in  his  thoughts,  a  comprehen- 
siveness in  his  arguments,  and  a  binding  force  in  his* 
conclusions,  which  were  perfectly  irresistible.  The 
vast  throng  were  silent  as  death  ;  every  eye  was  fixed 
upon  the  speaker,  and  all  gave  him  serious  attention. 
He  was  the  tall  man  eloquent ;  his  countenance  glowed 
with  animation,  and  his  eye  glistened  with  an  intelli- 
gence that  made  it  lustrous.  He  was  no  longer 
awkward  and  ungainly  ;  but  graceful,  bold,  command- 
ing. 

"  Mr.  Douglas  had  been  quietly  smoking  up  to  this 
time;  but  here  he  forgot  liis  cigar  and  listened  with 
anxious  attention.  When  he  rose  to  reply  he  appeared 
excited,  disturbed,  and  his  second  effort  seemed  to  us 
vastly  inferior  to  his  first.  Mr.  Lincoln  had  given  him 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  81 

a  great  task,  and  Mr.  Douglas  had  not  time  to  answer 
him,  even  if  he  had  the  ability." 

THE    DEBATES. 

Mr.  Lincoln,  on  the  evening  before  the  Freeport 
debate,  upon  informing  a  few  of  his  friends  of  the 
queries  he  was  going  to  put  to  Mr.  Douglas  (including 
that,  in  reference  to  the  power  of  the  territorial  legisla- 
ture, notwithstanding  the  Dred  Scott-  decision,  to  ex- 
clude slavery),  was  told  by  his  friends  that  if  he  cornered 
Douglas  on  that  question,  the  latter  would  surely 
"  take  the  bull  by  the  horns/'  and,  making  a  virtue  of 
necessity,  assert  his  Squatter  Sovereignty  in  defiance 
of  the  Dred  Scott  decision  ;  "  and  that,"  remarked  Mr. 
L/s  friends,  "will  make  him  Senator/''  "That  may 
be,"  said  Lincoln,  and  his  large  gray  eye  twinkled  ; 
"  but  if  he  takes  that  shoot,  HE  never  can  be  President." 
All  that  has  transpired  since  has  but  justified  Mr.  L/s 
prediction.  The  Eepublicans,  after  the  Supreme  Court 
had  made  their  decision,  and  Douglas  had  unreservedly 
endorsed  it,  saw  the  advantage  they  had  over  the 
Democrats  in  the  canvass,  for  they  could  quote  Dred 
Scott  as  a  knock-down  argument  against  Popular 
Sovereignty.  Mr.  Douglas,  too,  saw  this,  and  said 
very  little  in  his  first  speeches  about  popular  sover- 
eignty, but  assumed  the  offensive,  and  attacked  the 
Eepublican  party,  charging  it  with  negro  equality,  &c. 
If  he  could  have  got  through  with  that  canvass  with- 
out expressing  his  opinion  as  to  the  power  of  a  territo- 
rial legislature  over  the  subject  of  slavery — which 
opinion  he  had  sedulously  avoided  expressing  during 
all  the  Lecompton  controversy  in  the  Senate — he  un- 

4* 


82  LIFE    AND     SPEECHES    OF 

doubtedly  could  now  have  been  able  to  reconcile  all 
other  differences  of  opinion  between  himself  and  the 
Southern  Democracy.  But  Mr.  Lincoln's  logical  mind 
was  more  eager  to  probe  this  gigantic  sophistry,  with 
which  the  American  public  were  being  cheated,  than  to 
be  Senator.  So,  while  Douglas  was  making  ad  captan- 
dum  appeals  to  the  prejudices  of  the  people,  Lincoln 
was  weaving  around  him,  slowly  but  surely,  the  web  in 
which,  at  Freeport,  he  became  entangled,  and  from 
which  he  has  ever  since  been  vainly  endeavoring  to  ex- 
tricate himself. 

Of  this  great  contest  the  Philadelphia  North  Amer- 
ican, always  conservative  and  cautious,  remarks  : 

"  Stephen  A.  Douglas  had  ten  times  his  education. 
Mr.  Lincoln  was  mostly  engaged  in  his  profession,  mas- 
tered amidst  great  discouragements,  but  practised  with 
ominent  success.  He  had  some  experience,  however, 
as  a  general  politician,  besides  serving  for  a  while  in 
the  Illinois  Legislature,  and  for  two  years  in  Congress. 
Mr.  Douglas,  on  the  other  hand,  a  man  of  great  native 
force,  and  possessing  ten  times  the  scholastic  training 
of  his  rival,  had  been  for  full  fifteen  years  in  the  very 
heart  of  national  politics.  Indeed,  he  is  the  strongest 
among  the  representatives  of  democracy  under  its 
northern  phase,  and  we  doubt  if  Toombs,  Stephens, 
Benjamin,  or  Davis,  bright  luminaries  of  its  southern 
hemisphere,  can  rank  at  all  before  him. 

"  With  all  these  differences  in  political  and  other 
education,  in  a  State  that  has  been  democratic  ever 
since  its  admission  into  the  '  happy  family/  and  in  op- 
position to  a  popular  dogma,  Lincoln  stumped  Illinois 
against  Douglas,  and  carried  it.  The  speeches  on  both 
sides  were  many  and  able. 

"  Lincoln  was,  on  several  occasions,  partly  foiled  or, 
at  least,  badly  bothered.  In  most  cases  it  seemed  to 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  83 

be,  so  far  as  regarded  strength  and  skill,  a  drawn  bat- 
tle. In  more  than  one  instance  he  floored  the  l  little 
giant '  flatly  and  fairly.  We  consider  it,  on  the  whole, 
an  equal  fight.  Lincoln  showed  as  much  knowledge, 
and  as  much  logic,  with  more  wit,  good  humor,  and 
courtesy.  Douglas,  while  more  rough  and  overbearing, 
was  also  much  superior  in  a  certain  force,  directness 
and  determination.  But  it  was  about  an  equal  match 
in  ability.  As  for  the  result,  Douglas  carried  the  legis- 
lature, and  Lincoln  took  the  popular  vote,  as  he  can 
do  again.  Such  is  the  man  whom  democracy  will  now 
endeavor  to  decry — the  man  who  matched,  and  fully 
matched,  their  foremost  champion.  Both  of  them  are 
Self-made  men  ;  both  of  them  are  very  able  ;  both 
sprang  from  obscurity  to  distinction  ;  both  belong  to 
the  common  people  ;  and  both  will  be  found  to  be 
strong  with  the  masses.  We  would  advise  democracy, 
not  for  its  own  sake,  but  for  ours,  to  go  on  ridiculing 
Abraham  Lincoln  for  having  once  mauled  logs,  and  de- 
scribing him  as  a  third-rate  man.  These  little  pop- 
guns will  soon  be  silenced  by  the  roar  of  the  popular 
Paixhans." 

Mr.  Greeley  says : 

"  I  tell  you,  the  man  who  stumps  a  State  with  Ste- 
phen A.  Douglas,  and  meets  him,  day  after  day,  before 
the  people,  has  got  to  be  no  fool.  Many  a  man  will 
make  a  better  first  speech  than  Douglas,  but,  giving 
and  taking,  back  and  forward,  he  is  very  sharp.  Now, 
the  man  who  went  through  the  State,  speaking  against 
Stephen  A.  Douglas,  and  was  not  beaten,  as  no  man 
says  he  was,  is  not  a  common  man ;  for  no  common 
man  will  answer  for  that  work  ;  and  at  the  end  of  that 
cumpaign  Mr.  Lincoln  came  out  with  4,000  majority 
on  the  popular  vote,  although  Mr.  Buchanan  had  beaten 
Fremont  9,000,  and  the  general  feeling  outside  of  the 
State  was  that  Douglas  had  better  be  elected.  Mr. 
Crittenden  wrote  a  letter  which  elected  Douglas ;  he 


84  LIFE      AND      SPEECHES     OF 

said  that  it  was  better  that  Douglas  should  be  elected, 
and  there  were  30,000  Americans  there  ;  I  don't  be- 
lieve we  have  got  another  man  living  who  would  have 
fought  through  that  campaign  so  effectively  and  at  tho 
same  time  so  good-naturedly  as  he  did.  Mr.  Trumbull 
would  have  begun  a  little  ranker,  but  one  or  the  other 
would  soon  have  been  knocked  off  the  platform.  Mr. 
Lincoln  went  through  with  perfect  good  nature  and  en- 
tire -suavity,  and  beat  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  it  being 
the  first  time  any  man  on  our  side  ever  earned  that 
State." 

In  a  recent  debate  in  the  Senate  of  the  United 
States,  Senator  Benjamin,  one  of  the  ablest  men  in  the 
Senate  and  the  finest  orator,  took  up  the  debates  be- 
tween Mr.  Douglas  and  Mr.  Lincoln  for  examination, 
and  though  the  vehement  enemy  of  Kepublicans  and 
Republicanism,  he  complimented  Mr.  Lincoln  very 
highly.  Said  Mr.  Benjamin  : 

"  Here,  Mr.  President,  let  me  come  back  to  an  ex- 
planation of  that  fact  which  I  spoke  of  before,  and  to 
which  I  asked  the  attention  of  the  Senate  and  the 
country.  There  stands  the  explanation  of  the  sudden 
change  that  has  been  wrought  in  the  relations  of  the 
Senator  from  Illinois  with  the  rest  of  the  Democratic 
party.  It  was  when,  in  the  year  1858,  the  year  follow- 
ing this  decision,  pressed  by  a  canvass  at  home,  eager 
to  return  to  the  Senate,  he  joined  in  canvassing  the 
State  of  Illinois  with  the  gentleman  who  is  now  the 
candidate  of  the  Black  Republican  party  for  the  Pres- 
idency. Pressed  in  different  portions  of  the  State 
with  this  very  argument,  that  he  had  agreed  to  leave 
the  question  to  the  court,  that  the  court  had  decided  it 
in  favor  of  the  South,  and  that,  therefore,  under  the 
Kansas-Nebraska  bill,  slavery  was  fixed  in  all  the  ter- 
ritories of  the  United  States — finding  himself  going 
down  in  Illinois,  in  that  canvass,  he  backed  out  from 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  85 

his  promise,  and  directly  told  the  people  of  his  State 
that,  whether  it  had  been  decided  or  not,  and  no  mat- 
ter what  the  court  might  decide,  the  Kansas-Nebraska 
bill  had  fixed  the  power  in  the  people  of  the  North  to 
make  every  territory  in  the  Union  free. 

"In  that  contest  the  two  candidates  for  the  Senate 
of  the  United  States,  in  the  State  o'f  Illinois,  went  be- 
fore their  people.  They  agreed  to  discuss  the  issues  ; 
they  put  questions  to  each  other  for  answer  ;  and  I  must 
say  here,  for  I  must  be  just  to  all,  that  I  have  been  sur- 
prised in  the  examination  that  I  made  again  within  the 
last  few  days  of  this  discussion  between  Mr.  Lincoln  and 
Mr.  Douglas,  to  find  that  Mr.  Lincoln  is  a  far  more  con- 
servative man,  unless  he  has  since  changed  his  opinions, 
than  I  had  supposed  him  to  be.  There  was  no  dodging 
on  his  part.  Mr.  Douglas  started  with  his  questions. 
Here  they  are,  with  Mr.  Lincoln's  answers  : 

"  Question  1.  '  I  desire  to  know  whether  Lincoln  to- 
day stands,  as  he  did  in  1854,  in  favor  of  the  uncondi- 
tional repeal  of  the  fugitive  slave  law  ?' 

"  Answer.  'I  do  not  now,  nor  ever  did,  stand  in 
favor  of  the  unconditional  repeal  of  the  fugitive  slave 
law/ 

"  Question  2.  'I  desire  him  to  answer  whether  he 
stands  pledged  to-day,  as  he  did  in  1854,  against  the 
admission  of  any  more  slave  States  into  the  Union, 
even  if  the  people  want  them  ?' 

"  Answer.  1 1  do  not  now,  nor  ever  did,  stand  pledg- 
ed against  the  admission  of  any  more  slave  States  into 
the  Union/ 

"  Question  3.  '  I  want  to  know  whether  he  stands 
pledged  against  the  admission  of  a  new  State  into  the 
Union  with  such  a  constitution  as  the  people  of  that 
State  may  see  fit  to  make  ?' 

"  Answer.  '  I  do  not  stand  pledged  against  the 
admission  of  a  new  State  into  the  Union  with  such  a 
constitution  as  the  people  of  that  State  may  see  fit  to 
make  ?' 


86  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

"  Question  4.  '  I  want  to  know  whether  he  stands 
to-day  pledged  to  the  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  Dis- 
trict of  Columbia  ?' 

"Answer.  <I  do  not  stand  to-day  pledged  to  the 
abolition  of  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia.' 

"  Question  5.  '  I  desire  him  to  answer  whether  he 
stands  pledged  to  the  prohibition  of  the  slave  trade  be- 
tween the  different  States  ?' 

"  Answer.  '  I  do  not  stand  pledged  to  the  prohibition 
of  the  slave  trade  between  the  different  States/ 

"  Question  6.  'I  desire  to  know  whether  he  stands 
pledged  to  prohibit  slavery  in  all  the  territories  of  the 
United  States,  north  as  well  as  south  of  the  Missouri 
Compromise  line  ?' 

"  Answer.  '  I  am  impliedly,  if  not  expressly,  pledged 
to  a  belief  in  the  right  and  duty  of  Congress  to  prohibit 
slavery  in  all  the  United  States  territories.' 

"Question  7.  'I  desire  him  to  answer  whether  he  is 
opposed  to  the  acquisition  of  any  new  territory  unless 
slavery  is  first  prohibited  therein  ?' 

"  Answer.  '  I  am  not  generally  opposed  to  honest 
acquisition  of  territory  ;  and,  in  any  given  case,  I 
would  or  would  not  oppose  such  acquisition,  accordingly 
as  I  might  think  such  acquisition  would  or  would  not 
aggravate  the  slavery  question  among  ourselves/ 

"  It  is  impossible,  Mr.  President,  however  we  may 
differ  in  opinion  with  the  man,  not  to  admire  the  per- 
fect candor  and  frankness  with  which  these  answers 
were  given  ;  no  equivocation — no  evasion.  The  Sena- 
tor from  Illinois  had  his  questions  put  to  him  in  his 
turn.  All  I  propose  to  do  now  is  to  read  his  answer  to 
the  second  question  : 

"  '  The  next  question  propounded  to  me  by  Mr.  Lin- 
coln is, t  Can  the  people  of  a  territory,  in  any  lawful  way, 
against  the  wishes  of  any  citizen  of  the  United  States, 
exclude  slavery  from  their  limits  prior  to  the  formation 
of  a  State  constitution  ?'  I  answer  emphatically,  as 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  87 

Mr.  Lincoln  has  heard  me  answer  a  hundred  times 
from  every  stump  in  Illinois,  that,  in  my  opinion,  the 
people  of  a  territory  can,  by  lawful  means,  exclude 
slavery  from  their  limits  prior  to  the  formation  of  a 
State  constitution.  Mr.  Lincoln  knew  that  I  had  an- 
swered that  question  over  and  over  again.  He  heard 
me  argue  the  Nebraska  bill  on  that  principle  all  over 
the  State  in  1854,  in  1855,  and  in  1856,  and  he  has  no 
excuse  for  pretending  to  be  in  doubt  as  to  my  position 
on  that  question/ 

"  All  that  was  true  ;  but  see  the  art ;  the  decision 
had  not  come  yet ;  now  the  decision  has  come  ;  now 
what  ? 

"  '  It  matters  not  what  way  the  Supreme  Court  may 
hereafter  decide  as  to  the  abstract  question,  whether 
slavery  may  or  may  not  go  into  a  territory  under  the 
Constitution,  the  people  have  the  lawful  means  to 
introduce  or  exclude  it  as  they  please,  for  the  reason 
that  slavery  cannot  exist  a  day  or  an  hour  anywhere 
unless  it  is  supported  by  local  police  regulations. 
Those  police  regulations  can  only  be  established  by 
the  local  legislature  ;  and  if  the  people  are  opposed  to 
slavery,  they  will  elect  representatives  to  that  body 
who  will,  by  unfriendly  legislation,  effectually  prevent 
the  introduction  of  it  into  their  midst.  If,  on  the  con- 
trary, they  are  for  it,  their  legislation  will  favor  its 
extension.  Hence,  no  matter  what  the  decision  of  the 
Supreme  Court  may  be  on  that  abstract  question,  still 
the  right  of  the  people  to  make  a  slave  territory  or  a 
free  territory  is  perfect  and  complete  under  the  Nebras- 
ka bill.  I  hope  Mr.  Lincoln  deems  my  answer  satis- 
factory on  that  point.' 

"  Well,  sir,  what  occurred  further  in  that  contro- 
versy? His  competitor  was  shocked  at  the  profli- 
gacy of  the  Senator.  His  competitor  said  to  him — 
and  here  is  the  argument — '  Everybody  knows  that  the 
Dred  Scott  decision  has  determined  the  principle  that 
a  citizen  of  the  South  has  a  right  to  go  into  the  terri- 


8  LIFEAND     SPEECHES     OF 

tory,  and  there,  under  the  Constitution,  his  property 
is  protected,  and  yet  you  are  telling  the  people  here 
that  their  legislators,  when  they  swear  to  support  the 
Constitution,  can  violate  that  constitutional  provision/ 
Mr.  Lincoln  held  up  his  hands  in  horror  at  the  propo- 
sition. He  was  bold  in  the  assertion  of  his  own  prin- 
ciples ;  hut  he  told  the  Senator  from  Illinois  in  that 
discussion,  that  what  he  was  saying  was  a  gross  out- 
rage on  propriety,  and  was  breaking  the  bargain  he 
had  made.  But  again,  sir,  he  told  the  Senator  from 
Illinois  that  he  did  not  believe  in  the  Dred  Scott  de- 
cision, because,  said  he,  if  the  Dred  Scott  decision  be 
true,  and  slavery  exists  in  the  territories  under  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States,  then  it  also  exists 
in  the  States — it  exists  in  Pennsylvania  as  well  as  in 
Kansas. 

"  The  contest  ended.  On  the  popular  vote, .  the 
Senator  from  Illinois  was  beaten  ;  but  according  to 
the  division  of  the  representative  and  senatorial  dis- 
tricts of  the  State,  he  was  re-elected.  The  popular 
vote  upon  the  election  of  members  of  the  Senate  and 
Legislature  was  one  hundred  and  twenty-one  thousand 
in  his  favor,  one  hundred  and  twenty-five  thousand  in 
favor  of  the  Republican  candidate,  and  five  thousand 
votes  in  favor  of  what  he  called  the  Danites.  All  the 
State  Eepublican  officers  were  elected  ;  but  there  was 
a  majority  of  the  Legislature  of  Illinois  elected  in  favor 
the  Senator  from  Illinois,  and  he  came  back  here  in 
triumph. 

"Last  spring  I  was  forced  to  leave  my  country  from 
an  attack  of  a  disease  in  the  eyes,  which  required  at- 
tention abroad.  I  went  to  get  the  attention  of  emi- 
nent oculists  abroad.  For  six  or  eight  months  I  was 
debarred  from  reading  or  writing.  I  came  back  just 
before  the  opening  of  this  Congress  ;  and  I  found  that 
during  my  absence  the  honorable  Senator  from  Illinois 
had  been  engaged  in  a  controversy  in  the  public  jour- 
nals and  magazines  of  the  country  in  relation  to  the 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  89 

principles  that  governed  the  territories  of  the  United 
States,  and  that  he  had  copied  into  those  articles  the 
very  arguments  that  his  Republican  opponent  in  Illi- 
nois had  used  against  him,  and  was  then  using  against 
the  Democratic  party.  [Laughter.]  I  have  got  them 
here.  First,  that  it  may  not  be  said  that  I  originated 
this  charge,  after  these  magazine  articles  were  printed, 
and  after  the  Senator's  opponent,  Mr.  Lincoln,  had 
taxed  him  with  want  of  good  faith  under  the  Constitu- 
tion for  alleging  the  power  of  the  local  legislature  to 
go  through  with  this  unfriendly  legislation,  in  a  subse- 
quent speech,  delivered  at  Columbus,  Ohio,  in  Septem- 
ber, 1859,  Mr.  Lincoln  said  to  the  people  : 

"Judge  Douglas  says,  if  the  Constitution  carries 
slavery  into  the  territories,  beyond  the  power  of  the 
people  of  the  territories  to  control  it  as  other  property, 
then  it  follows  logically  that  every  one  who  swears  to 
support  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  must 
give  that  support  to  that  property  which  it  needs.  And 
if  the  Constitution  carries  slavery  into  the  territories, 
beyond  the  power  of  the  people  to  control  it  as  other 
property,  then  it  also  carries  it  into  the  States,  because 
the  Constitution  is  the  supreme  law  of  the  land.  Now, 
gentlemen,  if  it  were  not  for  my  excessive  modesty,  I 
would  say  that  I  told  that  veiy  thing  to  Judge  Doug- 
las quite  a  year  ago.  This  argument  is  here  in  print, 
and  if  it  were  not  for  my  modesty,  as  I  said,  I  might 
call  your  attention  to  it.  If  you  read  it,  you  will  find 
that  I  not  only  made  that  argument,  but  made  it  better 
than  he  has  made  it.  since."  (Laughter.) 

The  first  debate  took  place  at  Ottawa,  and  Mr. 
Douglas  made  the  opening  speech,  in  the  course  of 
which  he  made  a  singular  charge  against  Mr.  Lincoln, 
which  was  as  follows  : 

"  In  1854,  Mr.  Abraham  Lincoln  and  Mr.  Trumbull 
entered  into  an  arrangement,  one  with  the  other,  and 


90  LIFEAND     SPEECHES     OF 

each  with  his  respective  friends,  to  dissolve  the  old 
Whig  party  on  the  one  hand,  and  to  dissolve  the  old 
Democratic  party  on  the  other,  and  to  connect  the  mem- 
bers of  both  into  an  Abolition  party,  under  the  name 
and  disguise  of  a  Kepublican  party.  The  terms  of 
that  arrangement  between  Mr.  Lincoln  and  Mr.  Trum- 
bull  have  been  published  to  the  world  by  Mr.  Lincoln's 
special  friend,  James  H.  Matheny,  Esq.,  and  they 
were,  that  Lincoln  should  have  Shields' place  in  theU.  S. 
Senate,  which  was  then  about  to  become  vacant,  and 
that  Trumbull  should  have  my  seat  when  my  term  ex- 
pired. Lincoln  went  to  work  to  abolitionize  the  old 
Whig  party  all  over  the  State,  pretending  that  he  was 
then  as  good  a  Whig  as  ever  ;  and  Trumbull  went  to 
work  in  his  part  of  the  State  preaching  abolitionism 
in  its  milder  and  lighter  form,  and  trying  to  abolition- 
ize the  Democratic  party,  and  bring  old  Democrats, 
handcuffed  and  bound  hand  and  foot,  into  the  Abolition 
camp.  In  pursuance  of  the  arrangement,  the  parties 
met  in  Springfield  in  October,  1854,  and  proclaimed 
their  new  platform.  Lincoln  was  to  bring  into  the 
Abolition  camp  the  old  line  Whigs,  and  transfer  them 
over  to  G-iddings,  Chase,  Fred.  Douglas,  and  Parson 
Lovejoy,  who  were  ready  to  receive  them,  and  christen 
them  in  their  new  faith.  They  laid  down,  on  that  oc- 
casion, a  platform  for  their  new  Republican  party, 
which  was  to  be  thus  constructed." 

To  this  charge,  Mr.  Lincoln  replied : 

"  When  a  man  hears  himself  somewhat  misrepre- 
sented, it  provokes  him — at  least,  I  find  it  so  with 
myself ;  but  when  misrepresentation  becomes  very  gross 
and  palpable,  it  is  more  apt  to  amuse  him.  The  first 
thing  I  see  fit  to  notice,  is  the  fact  that  Judge  Doug- 
las alleges,  after  running  through  the  history  of  the 
old  Democratic  and  the  old  Whig  parties,  that  Judge 
Trumbull  and  myself  made  an  arrangement  in  1854, 
by  which  I  was  to  have  the  place  of  General  Shields 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  91 

in  the  United  States  Senate,  and  Judge  Trumbull  was 
to  have  the  place  of  Judge  Douglas1.  Now,  all  I  have 
to  say  upon  that  subject  is,  that  I  think  no  man — not 
even  Judge  Douglas — can  prove  it,  because  it  is  not 
true.  I  have  no  doubt  he  is  '  conscientious  '  in  saying- 
it.  As  to  those  resolutions  that  he  took  such  a  length 
of  time  to  read,  as  being  the  platform  of  the  Republi- 
can party  in  1854,  I  say  that  I  never  had  anything  to 
do  with  them,  and  I  think  Trumbull  never  had.  Judge 
Douglas  cannot  show  that  either  of  us  ever  did  have 
anything  to  do  with  them.  I  believe  this  is  true  about 
those  resolutions  :  There  was  a  call  for  a  convention 
to  form  a  Eepublican  party  at  Springfield,  and  I  think 
that  my  friend,  Mr.  Lovejoy,  who  is  here  upon  this 
stand,  had  a  hand  in  it.  I  think  this  is  true,  and  I 
think  if  he  will  remember  accurately,  he  will  be  able 
to  recollect  that  he  tried  to  get  me  into  it,  and  I  would 
not  go  in.  I  believe  it  is  also  true  that  I  went  away 
from  Springfield  when  the  convention  was  in  session, 
to  attend  court  in  Tazewell  county.  It  is  true  they 
did  place  my  name,  though  without  authority,  upon 
the  committee,  and  afterward  wrote  me  to  attend  the 
meeting  of  the  committee,  but  I  refused  to  do  so,  and 
I  never  had  anything  to  do  with  that  organization. 
This  is  the  plain  truth  about  all  that  matter  of  the 
resolutions/' 

In  the  reply,  Mr.  Lincoln  uttered  the  subjoined 
forcible  and  eloquent  paragraph,  upon  negro  equality  : 

"  Now,  gentlemen,  I  don't  want  to  read  at  any 
greater  length,  but  this  is  the  true  complexion  of  all 
I  have  ever  said  in  regard  to  the  institution  of  slavery 
and  the  black  race.  This  is  the  whole  of  it,  and  any- 
thing that  argues  me  into  his  idea  of  perfect  social  and 
political  equality  with  the  negro,  is  but  a  specious  and 
fantastic  arrangement  of  words,  by  which  a  man  can 
prove  a  horse-chestnut  to  be  a  chestnut-horse.  I  will 
say  here,  while  upon  this  subject,  that  I  have  no  pur- 


92  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

pose,  directly  or  indirectly,  to  interfere  with  the  insti- 
tution of  slavery  in  the  States  where  it  now  exists.  I 
believe  I  have  no  lawful  right  to  do  so,  and  I  have  no 
inclination  to  do  so.  I  have  no  purpose  to  introduce 
political  and  social  equality  between  the  white  and  the 
black  races.  There  is  a  physical  difference  between  the 
two,  which,  in  my  judgment,  will  probably  forever 
forbid  their  living  together  upon  the  footing  of  perfect 
equality,  and  inasmuch  as  it  becomes  a  necessity  that 
there  must  be  a  difference,  I,  as  well  as  Judge  Doug- 
las, am  in  favor  of  the  race  to  which  I  belong  having 
the  superior  position.  I  have  never  said  anything  to 
the  contrary,  but  I  hold  that,  notwithstanding  all  this, 
there  is  no  reason  in  the  world  why  the  negro  is  not 
entitled  to  all  the  natural  rights  enumerated  in  the 
Declaration  of  Independence — the  right  to  life,  liberty, 
and  the  pursuit  of  happiness.  I  hold  that  he  is  as 
much  entitled  to  these  as  the  white  man.  I  agree  with 
Judge  Douglas  he  is  not  my  equal  in  many  respects — 
certainly  not  in  color,  perhaps  not  in  moral  or  intellec- 
tual endowment.  But  in  the  right  to  eat  the  bread, 
without  the  leave  of  any  one  else,  which  his  own  hand 
earns,  he  is  my  equal,  and  the  equal  of  Judge  Doug- 
las, and  the  equal  of  every  living  man." 

Mr.  Douglas  also  undertook  to  give  a  little  sketch  of 
his  opponent's  personal  history  in  his  speech",  and  after 
the  following  fashion  : 

"  In  the  remarks  I  have  made  on  this  platform,  and 
the  position  of  Mr.  Lincoln  upon  it,  I  mean  nothing 
personally  disrespectful  or  unkind  to  that  gentleman. 
I  have  known  him  for  nearly  twenty-five  years.  There 
were  many  points  of  sympathy  between  us  when  we 
first  got  acquainted.  We  were  both  comparatively 
boys,  and  both  struggling  with  poverty  in  a  strange 
land.  I  was  a  -school-teacher  in  the  town  of  Winches^ 
ter,  and  he  a  flourishing  grocery-keeper  in  the  town  of 
Salem.  He  was  more  successful  in  his  occupation  than' 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN.  93 

I  was  in  mine,  and  hence  more  fortunate  in  this  world's 
goods.  Lincoln  is  one  of  those  peculiar  men  who  per- 
form with  admirable  skill  everything  which  they  under- 
take. I  made  as  good  a  school-teacher  as  I  could,  and 
when  a  cabinet-maker  I  made  a  good  bedstead  and  ta- 
bles, although  my  old  boss  said  I  succeeded  better  with 
bureaus  and  secretaries  than  with  anything  else  ;  but  I 
believe  that  Lincoln  was  always  more  successful  in  bus- 
iness than  I,  for  his  business  enabled  him  to  get  into 
the  Legislature.  I  met  him  there,  however,  and  had  a 
sympathy  with  him,  because  of  the  up-hill  struggle  we 
both  had  in  life.  He  was  then  just  as  good  at  telling 
an  anecdote  as  now.  He  could  beat  any  of  the  boys 
wrestling,  or  running  a  foot-race,  in  pitching  quoits  or 
tossing  a  copper  ;  could  ruin  more  liquor  than  all  the 
boys  of  the  town  together,  and  the  dignity  and  impar- 
tiality with  which  he  presided  at  a  horse-race  or  fist- 
fight,  excited  the  admiration  and  won  the  praise  of  ev- 
erybody that  was  present  and  participated.  I  sympa- 
thized with  him,  because  he  was  struggling  with  diffi- 
culties, and  so  was  I.  Mr.  Lincoln  served  with  me  in' 
the  Legislature  in  1836,  when  we  both  retired,  and  he 
subsided,  or  became  submerged,  and  he  was  lost  sight 
of  as  a  public  man  for  some  years.  In  1846,  when 
Wilmot  introduced  the  celebrated  proviso,  and  the  Ab- 
olition tornado  swept  over  the  country,  Lincoln  again 
turned  up  as  a  member  of  Congress  from  the  Sanga- 
mon  district.  I  was  then  in  'the  Senate  of  the  United 
States,  and  was  glad  to  welcome  my  old  friend  and 
companion.  While  in  Congress,  he  distinguished  him- 
self by  his  opposition  to  the  Mexican  war,  taking  the 
side  of  the  common  enemy  against  his  own  country  ; 
and  when  he  returned  home  he  found  that  the  indigna- 
tion of  the  people  followed  him  everywhere,  and  he 
was  again  submerged  or  obliged  to  retire  into  private 
life,  forgotten  by  his  former  friends." 

To  which  Mr.  Lincoln  replied : 


94  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

"  The  Judge  is  wofully  at  fault  about  his  early  friend 
Lincoln  being  a  '  grocery-keeper/  I  don't  know  «is  it 
would  be  a  great  sin  if  I  had  been  ;  but  he  is  mista- 
ken. Lincoln  never  kept  a  grocery  anywhere  in  the 
world.  It  is  true  that  Lincoln  did  work  the  latter  part 
of  one  winter  in  a  little  still-house  up  at  the  head  of  a 
hollow.  And  so  I  think  my  friend,  the  Judge,  is 
equally  at  fault  when  he  charges  me  at  the  time  when 
I  was  in  Congress  of  having  opposed  our  soldiers  who 
were  fighting  in  the  Mexican  war.  The  Judge  did  not 
make  his  charge  very  distinctly,  but  I  can  tell  you 
what  he  can  prove  by  referring  to  the  record.  You  re- 
member I  was  an  old  Whig,  and  whenever  the  Demo- 
cratic party  tried  to  get  me  to  vote  that  the  war  hud 
been  righteously  begun  by  the  President,  I  would  not 
do  it.  But  whenever  they  asked  for  any  money,  or 
land-warrants,  or  anything  to  pay  the  soldiers  there, 
during  all  that  time,  I  gave  the  same  vote  that  Judge 
Douglas  did.  You  can  think  as  you  please  as  to  whether 
that  was  consistent.  Such  is  the  truth  ;  and  the  Judge 
has  a  right  to  make  all  he  can  out  of  it.  But  when  he, 
by  a  general  charge,  conveys  the  idea  that  I  withheld 
supplies  from  the  soldiers  who  were  fighting  in  the 
Mexican  war,  or  did  anything  else  to  hinder  the  sol- 
diers, he  is,  to  say  the  least,  grossly  and  altogether  mis- 
taken,'as  a  consultation  of  the  records  will  prove  to 
him." 

Mr.  Lincoln,  before  he  was  through,  made  the  follow- 
ing amusing  point  on  Mr.  Douglas,  in  reply  to  his  con- 
tinual talk  about  the  Supreme  Court  and  reverence  for 
its  decisions  : 

"  This  man  sticks  to  a  decision  which  forbids  the  peo- 
ple of  a  territory  from  excluding  slavery,  and  he  does  so 
not  because  he  says  it  is  right  in  itself — he  does  not  give 
any  opinion  on  that — but  because  it  has  been  decided  by 
the  court,  and  being  decided  "by  the  court,  lie  is,  and 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN.  95 

you  are  bound  to  take  it  in  your  political  action  as 
law — not  that  he  judges  at  all  of  its  merits,  but  because 
a  decision  of  the  court  is  to  him  a  "  Thus  saith  the 
Lord."  He  places  it  on  that  ground  alone,  and  you 
will  bear  in  mind  that,  thus  committing  himself  unre- 
servedly to  this  decision,  commits  him  to  the  next  one 
just  as' firmly  as  to  this.  He  did  not  commit  himself 
on  account  of  the  merit  or  demerit  of  the  decision,  but 
it  is  a  Thus  saith  the  Lord.  The  next  decision,  as 
much  as  this,  will  be  a  Thus  saith  the  Lord.  There  is 
nothing  that  can  divert  or  turn  him  away  from  this  de- 
cision. It  is  nothing  that  I  point  out  to  him  that  his 
great  prototype,  Gen.  Jackson,  did  not  believe  in  the 
binding  force  of  decisions.  It  is  nothing  to  him-  that 
Jefferson  did  not  so  believe.  I  have  said  that  I  have 
often  heard  him  approve  of  Jackson's  course  in  disre- 
garding the  decision  of  the  Supreme  Court  pronouncing 
a  National  Bank  constitutional.  He  says,  I  did  not 
hear  him  say  so.  He  denies  the  accuracy  of  my  recol- 
lection. I  say  he  ought  to  know  better  than  I,  but  I 
will  make  no  question  about  this  thing,  though  it  still 
seems  to  me  that  I  heard  him  say  it  twenty  times.  I 
will  tell  him  though,  that  he  now  claims  to  stand  on 
the  Cincinnati  platform,  which  affirms  that  Congress 
cannot  charter  a  National  Bank,  in  the  teeth  of  that 
old  standing  decision  that  Congress  can  charter  a  bank. 
And  I  remind  him  of  another  piece  of  history  on  the 
question  of  'respect  for  judicial  decisions,  and  it  is  a 
piece  of  Illinois  history,  belonging  to  a  time  when  the 
large  party  to  which  Judge  Douglas  belonged,  were  dis- 
pleased with  a  decision  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Illi- 
nois, because  they  had  decided  that  a  Governor  could 
not  remove  a  Secretary  of  State.  You  will  find  the 
whole  story  in  Ford's  History  of  Illinois,  and  I  know 
that  Judge  Douglas  will  not  deny  that  he  was  then  in 
favor  of  overslaughing  that  decision  by  the  mode  of 
adding  five  new  Judges,  so  as  to  vote  down  the  four  old 
ones.  Not  only  so,  but  it  ended  in  the  Judge's  sitting 


96  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES    OF 

down  on  that  very  bench  as  one  of  the  five  new  Judges 
to  break  down  the  four  old  ones.  It  was  in  this  way 
precisely  that  he  got  his  title  of  Judge.  Now,  when 
the  Judge  tells  me  that  men  appointed  conditionally  to 
sit  as  members  of  a  court,  will  have  to  be  catechised 
beforehand  on  some  subject,  I  say,  '  You  know,  Judge  ; 
you  have  tried  it."  When  he  says  a-  court  of  this  kind 
will  lose  the  confidence  of  all  men,  will  be  prostituted 
and  disgraced  by  such  a  proceeding,  I  say,  '  You  know 
best,  Judge  ;  you  have  been  through  the  mill."  But 
I  cannot  shake  Judge  Douglas's  teeth  loose  from  the 
Dred  Scott  decision.  Like  some  obstinate  animal  (I 
mean  no  disrespect),  that  will  hang  on  when  he  has 
once  got  his  teeth  fixed  ;  you  may  cut  off  a  leg,  or  you 
may  tear  away  an  -arm,  still  he  will  not  relax  his  hold. 
And  so  I  may  point  out  to  the  Judge,  and  say  that  he 
is  bespattered  all  over,  frcjn  the  beginning  of  his  polit- 
ical life  to  the  present  time,  with  attacks  upon  judicial 
decisions — I  may  cut  off  limb  after  limb  of  his  public 
record,  and  strive  to  wrench  him  from  a  single  dictum 
of  the  court — yet  I  cannot  divert  him  from  it.  He 
hangs,  to  the  last,  to  the  Dred  Scott  decision.  These 
things  show  there  is  a  purpose  strong  as  death  and 
eternity  for  which  he  adheres  to  this  decision,  and  for 
which  he  will  adhere  to  all  other  decisions  of  the  same 
court." 

We  may  safely  challenge  the  annals  of  stump-speak- 
ing in  the  West  or  at  the  South  for  a  more  overwhelm- 
ing rejoinder  than  this. 

In  the  third  debate,  at  Jonesboro,  Mr.  Lincoln  said  : 

"  I  find  a  report  of  a  speech  made  by  Judge  Doug- 
las at  Joliet,  since  we  last  met  at  Freeport — published, 
I  believe,  in  the  Missouri  Republican — on  the  9th  of 
this  month,  in  which  Judge  Douglas  says  : 

"'You  know  at  Ottawa,  I  read  this  platform,  and 
asked  him  if  he  concurred  in  each  and  all  of  the  prin- 
ciples set  forth  in  it.  He  would  not  answer  these  ques- 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  97 

tions.  At  last  I  said  frankly,  "  I  wish  you  to  answer 
them,  because  when  I  get  them  up  here  where  the  color 
of  your  principles  are  a  little  darker  than  in  Egypt,  I 
intend  to  trot  you  down  to  Jonesboro."  The  very  no- 
tice that  I  was  going  to  take  him  down  to  Egypt  made 
him  tremble  in  the  knees  so  that  he  had  to  be  carried 
from  the  platform.  He  laid  up  seven  days,  and  in  the 
meantime  held  a  consultation  with  his  political  physi- 
cians ;  they  had  Lovejoy  and  Farns worth  and  all  the 
leaders  of  the  Abolition  party,  they  consulted  it  all 
over,  and  at  last  Lincoln  came  to  the  conclusion  that  he 
would  answer,  so  he  came  up  to  Freeport  last  Friday.' 
"  Now  that  statement  altogether  furnishes  a  subject 
for  philosophical  contemplation.  I  have  been  treating 
it  in  that  way,  and  I  have  really  come  to  the  conclu- 
sion that  I  can  explain  it  in  no  other  way  than  by  be- 
lieving the  Judge  is  crazy.  If  he  was  in  his  right 
mind,  I  cannot  conceive  how  he  would  have  risked  dis- 
gusting the  four  or  five  thousand  of  his  own  friends 
who  stood  there,  and  knew,  as  to  my  having  been 
carried  from  the  platform,  that  there  was  not  a  word  of 
truth  in  it." 

JUDGE  DOUGLAS — "  Didn't  they  carry  you  off?" 
MB.  LINCOLN — "  There  ;  that  question  illustrates 
the  character  of  this  man  Douglas,  exactly.  He  smiles 
now  and  says,  '  Didn't  they  carry  you  off  ?'  But  he 
said  then,  l  lie  had  to  be  carried  off;'  and  he  said  it  to 
convince  the  country  that  he  had  so  completely  broken 
me  down  by  his  speech  that  I  had  to  be  carried  away. 
Now  he  seeks  to  dodge  it,  and  asks,  '  Didn't  they  carry 
you  off?'  Yes,  they  did.  But,  Judge  Douglas,  why 
didn't  you  tell  the  truth  '{  I  would  like  to  know  why  you 
didn't  tell  the  truth  about  it.  And  then  again,  '  He 
laid  up  seven  days.'  He  puts  this  in  print  for  the  peo- 
ple of  the  country  to  read  as  a  serious  document.  I 
think  if  he  had  been  in  his  sober  senses  he  wpuld  not 
have  risked  that  barefacedness  in  the  presence  of  thou- 
sands of  his  own  friends,  who  knew  that  I  made 


98  BIFE    AND    SPEECHES    OF 

speeches  within  six  of  the  seven  days  at  Henry,  Mar- 
shall county,  Augusta,  Hancock  county,  and  Macomb, 
McD  enough  county,  including  all  the  necessary  travel 
to  meet  him  again  at  Freeport  at  the  end  of  the  six 
days.  Now,  I  say,  there  is  no  charitable  way  to  look 
at  that  statement,  except  to  conclude  that  he  is  ac- 
tually crazy.  There  is  another  thing  in  that  state- 
ment that  alarmed  me  very  greatly  as  he  states 
it,  that  he  was  going  to  '  trot  me  down  to  Egypt.' 
Thereby  he  would  have  you  to  infer  that  I  would  not 
come  to  Egypt  unless  he  forced  me — that  I  could  not 
be  got  here,  unless  he,  giantlike,  had  hauled  me  down 
here.  That  statement  he  makes,  too,  in  the  teeth  of 
the  knowledge  that  I  had  made  the  stipulation  to  come 
down  here,  and  that  Tie  himself  had  "been  very  reluc- 
tant to  enter  into  the  stipulation.  More  than  all  this, 
Judge  Douglas,  when  he  made  that  statement,  must 
have  been  crazy,  and  wholly  out  of  his  sober  senses, 
or  else  he  would  have  known  that  when  he  got  me 
down  here — that  promise — that  windy  promise — of  his 
powers  to  annihilate  me,  wouldn't  amount  to  anything. 
Now,  how  little  do  I  look  like  being  carried  away 
trembling  ?  Let  the  Judge  go  on,  and  after  he  is  done 
with  his  half  hour,  I  want  you  all,  if  I  can't  go  home 
myself,  to  let  me  stay  and  rot  here  ;  and  if  anything 
happens  to  the  Judge,  if  I  cannot  carry  him  to  the 
hotel  and  put  him  to  bed,  let  me  stay  here  and  rot.  I 
say,  then,  there  is  something  extraordinary  in  this 
statement.  I  ask  you  if  you  know  any  other  living 
man  who  would  make  such  a  statement  ?  I  will  ask 
my  friend  Casey,  over  there,  if  he  would  do  such  a 
thing  ?  Would  he  send  that  out  and  have  his  men 
take  it  as  the  truth  ?  Did  the  Judge  talk  of  trotting 
me  down  to  Egypt  to  scare  me  to  death  ?  Why,  I 
know  this  people  better  than  he  does.  I  was  raised 
just  a  little  east  of  here.  I  am  a  part  of  this  people. 
But  the  Judge  was  raised  further  north,  and,  perhaps, 
he  has  some  horrid  idea  of  what  this  people  might  be 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  99 

induced  to  do.  But  really  I  have  talked  about  this 
matter  perhaps  longer  than  I  ought,  for  it  is  no  great 
thing,  and  yet  the  smallest  are  often  the  most  difficult 
things  to  deal  with.  The  Judge  has  set  about  seriously 
trying  to  make  the  impression  that  when  we  meet  at 
different  places  I  am  literally  in  his  clutches — that  I 
am  a  poor,  helpless,  decrepit  mouse,  and  that  I  can  do 
nothing  at  all.  This  is  one  of  the  ways  he  has  taken 
to  create  that  impression.  I  don't  know  any  other  way 
to  meet  it,  except  this.  I  don't  wan't  to  quarrel  with 
him — to  call  him  a  liar — but  when  I  come  square  up 
to  him  I  don't  know  what  else  to  call  him,  if  I  must 
tell  the  truth  out.  I  want  to  be  at  peace,  and  reserve 
all  my  fighting  powers  for  necessary  occasions.  My 
time,  now,  is  very  nearly  out,  and  I  give  up  the  trifle 
that  is  left  to  the  Judge,  to  let  him  set  my  knees  trem- 
bling again,  if  he  can." 

Mr.  Greeley,  in  the  Tribune,  speaks  of  this  great 
Senatorial  contest,  and  its  result,  as  follows  : 

"  In  1858,  the  Kepublican  State  Convention  unani- 
mously designated  him  as  their  representative  man  to 
stump  the  State  against  Stephen  A.  Douglas.  They 
knew  that  the  struggle  would  be  a  desperate  one — that 
they  must  put  their  very  best  foot  foremost.  If  they 
had  had  a  champion  whom  they  supposed  abler  and 
worthier  than  Mr.  Lincoln,  they  would  have  chosen 
that  champion  for  this  arduous  service.  They  had 
nearly  all  heard  Lincoln  and  their  other  speakers, 
and  ought  to  have  known  by  this  time  who  was  their 
best  man  ;  yet  they  choose  Abraham  Lincoln.  If  they 
don't  know  who  is  their  best  man,  should  not  mission- 
aries be  sent  out  to  teach  them  ? 

"Mr.  Lincoln  went  into  this  canvass  under  most  dis- 
couraging auspices.  Many  leading  Eepublicans"  out  of 
the  State  thought  the  opposition  to  Mr.  Douglas  im- 
politic and  mistaken.  We  certainly  thought  so  ;  and, 
though  we  said  little  on  the  point,  our  very  silence  was 


100  LIFE      AND     SPEECHES     OF 

damaging  in  a  State  where  more  people  read  this  paper 
than  any  other.  It  has  been  a  hundred  times  asserted 
that  The  Tribune  '  defeated  Lincoln/  But  there  were 
other  outside  influences,  as  adverse  and  at  least  equally 
potent.  In  1856,  the  State  polled  37,444  American  or 
Whig  votes  for  Fillmore.  Many  of  these  were  cast  by 
natives  of  Kentucky  ;  all  by  men  who  love  and  -con- 
fide in  John  J.  Crittenden.  In  the  thickest  of  the  fray, 
a  letter  from  Mr.  Crittenden  was  published,  advising 
them  to  favor  Mr.  Douglas's  reelection.  Undoubtedly, 
this  had  an  overruling  influence  with  thousands.  Yet, 
after  Messrs.  Lincoln  and  Douglas  had  thoroughly  can- 
vassed the  State,  the  people  voted  with  the  following 
result : 

FREMONT.  FILLMORE.  BUCHANAN. 
Total  vote  in  1856 96,189  . .  37 ,444  . .  105,348 

LINCOLN.  LECOMPTON.  DOUGLAS. 
Total  vote  in  1858 125,275  ..  5,071  ..  121,190 

Linco  n's  gain  on  1856 29,086 

Douglas'  "  15,742 

Lincoln's  net  gain 14,345 

Or,  give  Douglas  the  entire  Lecompton  vote  in  addition 
to  his  own,  and  Lincoln  still  gains  on  him  9,273. 

"  Bear  in  mind  that  this  was  a  contest  in  which  the 
sympathies  of  men  indifferent  to  party  were  almost 
wholly  with  Douglas,  wherein  many  Kepublicans  sup- 
ported him  throughout,  wherein  Crittenden  summoned 
the  Americans  to  his  aid,  and  wherein  he  stood  boldly 
on  the  ground  of  Popular  Sovereignty,  with  the  pres- 
tige of  having  just  before  defeated  the  infamous  Le- 
compton bill.  All  things  considered,  we  recall  nothing 
in  the  history  of  political  campaigning  more  creditable 
to  a  canvasser  than  this  vote  is  to  Lincoln. 

"  We  have  thus  dwelt  throughout  on  facts  of  public 
record  or  of  universal  notoriety.  The  speeches  made 
to  the  same  audiences  in  that  canvass,  by  Messrs.  Lin- 
coln and  Douglas,  were  collected  and  printed  by  the 
Republicans  of  Ohio,  for  cheap  and  general  dissemina- 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN.  101 

tion,  long  before  they  dreamed  that  Mr.  Lincoln  would 
be  the  Republican  candidate  for  President.  We  had 
sold  hundreds  of  them  at  our  counter,  as  we  had  thou- 
sands of  Mr.  Lincoln's  speech  in  this  city,  before  the 
meeting  of  the  Chicago  Convention  ;  we  expect  to  sell 
thousands  of  the  former  and  tens  of  thousands  of  the 
latter  forthwith.  Every  reader  can  herein  see  just  what 
manner  of  man  Mr.  Lincoln  is,  and  how  he  bears  him- 
self when  confronted  with  one  of  the  very  best  and  most 
effective  popular  canvassers  in  the  democratic  ranks. 
If  Mr.  Lincoln  is  weak,  or  ill-informed,  or  anywise  de- 
ficient, this  protracted  discussion  with  Douglas  must 
show  it." 

The  Chicago  Tribune,  shortly  after  the  election  took 
place,  made  the  subjoined  statement  : 

"  The  majorities  for  members  of  Congress  are  as  fol- 
lows : 

First  district,  E.  B.  Washburne,  Rep 9,414 

Second  district,  J   F.  Farns worth,  Rep .' 8,639 

Third  district,  Owen  Lovejoy,  Rep 7.443 

Fourth  district,  William  Kellogg,  Rep 2,711 

Fifth  district,  Isaac  N.  Morris,  Dem. 1,961 

~Sixth  district,  Thomas  L.  Harris,  Dem 4,447 

Seventh  district,  J.  C.  Robinson,  Dem 1,759 

.  Eighth  district,  Philip  B.  Foulfce,  Dem 2,939 

Ninth  district,  John  A.  Logan.  Dem 12,847 

"  The  aggregate  votes  on  the  Congressional  tickets 
were  :  Republican,  126,084 ;  Douglas  Democratic, 
121,940  ;  Buchanan  Democratic,  5,091. 

"  The  vote  on  State  Treasurer  stands  :  James  Miller, 
Republican,  125,828  ;  W.  B.  Fondey,  Douglas  Demo- 
crat, 121,803  ;  John  Dougherty,  Buchanan  Democrat, 
5,091. 

"  These  returns  show,  that  taking  the  vote  on  Con- 
gressmen as  the  test,  the  Republican  majority  over  both 
the  Buchanan  and  Douglas  parties  is  97.  The  entire 
Buchanan  vote  is  5,091.  The  Republicans  retained 
every  county  that  went  for  Fremont  or  Bissell  in  1856. 


102  LIFE    AND    SPEECHES    OF 

They  "lost  not  one  which  they  carried  at  the  Presiden- 
tial election,  and  they  have  redeemed  from  the  Demo- 
crats seven  counties  which  went  for  Buchanan  two 
years  ago,  viz.  :  De  Witt,  Logan,  Coles,  Edgar,  Platt, 
Edwards,  and  Bond,  all  of  which  went  against  Gover- 
nor Bissell,  except  Edwards.  Peoria  can  almost  be 
added  to  the  column  of  the  redeemed  counties. 

"  Despite  the  unfair  apportionment,  by  which  Mr. 
Douglas  has  secured  both  branches  of  the  Legislature, 
the  Republicans  of  Illinois  have  abundant  reason  to  be 
satisfied  with  the  result  of  the  contest  through  which 
they  have  just  passed.  Taking  Fremont's  vote  as  a 
standard  of  comparison,  they  have  gained  nearly  30,000 
since  1856.  The  entire  vote  of  the  State  is  252,722, 
against  238,981  two  years  ago — a  difference  of  13,741." 

Mr.  Lincoln  and  his  fellow  Republicans  of  Illinois, 
far  from  being  discouraged  by  the  result  of  the  cam- 
paign, were  greatly  encouraged,  well  knowing  that 
with  such  gains,  such  a  steady  increase,  by  the  Repub- 
lican party  in  Illinois,  its  day  of  complete  triumph 
could  not  be  far  off. 

During  the  past  autumn  and  winter  Mr.  Lincoln 
visited  various  parts  of  the  country,  delivering  lectures 
upon  the  political  condition  of  the  country,  and  creat- 
ing unbounded  enthusiaism  wherever  he  went.  The 
Leavenworth  Register  speaks  as  follows  of  his  visit  to 
Kansas  : 

"  Hon.  Abraham  Lincoln  arrived  this  afternoon, 
about  two  o'clock.  Notwithstanding  the  inclemency  of 
the  weather,  he  was  met  on  Sixtli  street  by  a  large  con- 
course of  our  people,  which  augmented  as  it  neared 
Turner's  Hall,  and  when  it  reached  Delaware  street  it 
contained  seven  or  eight  hundred  persons.  The  proces- 
sion moved  down  Delaware  street  and  turned  up  Maine 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  103 

to  Shawnee,  and  up  Shawnee  to  the  Mansion  House. 
Along  the  sidewalks  a  dense  crowd  moved  with  the 
procession.  All  the  doors,  windows,  balconies,  and 
porticoes,  were  filled  with  men  and  women,  all  anxious 
to  get  a  sight  of  '  Honest  Old  Abe/  On  arriving 
at  the  Mansion  House  the  concourse  halted,  and  three 
long  and  loud  cheers  were  given  for  Lincoln. 

"The  crowd  by  this  time  had  swelled  to  an  immense 
audience,  filled  with  admiration  for  the  man  of  the 
people  and  the  veteran  warrior  of  freedom.  The  mar- 
shals of  the  day,  Capt.  Dickison  and  Capt.  Hays  of  the 
Turner  Association,  assisted  by  Mr.  Ketner  and  others, 
deserve  credit  for  the  manner  in  which  the  reception 
was  conducted. 

"  Never  did  man  receive  such  honors  at  the  hands  of 
our  people,  and  never  did  our  people  pay  honors  to  a 
better  man,  or  one  who  has  been  a  truer  friend  to 
Kansas.  The  name  of  '  Abe  Lincoln'  is  a  household 
word  in  Illinois,  Indiana,  and  Ohio.  Let  it  be  so  in 
Kansas,  for  we  owe  much  to  him  for  his  early  efforts  in 
behalf  of  freedom  in  Kansas." 

The  subjoined  paragraph  is  from  his  speech  at  Lear- 
enworth,  and  is  upon  the  subject  of  the  dissolution  of  the 
Union.  Said  he  : 

"  But  you,  Democrats,  are  for  the  Union  ;  and  you 
greatly  fear  the  success  of  the  Republicans  would  de- 
stroy the  Union.  Why  ?  Do  the  Republicans  declare 
against  the  Union  ?  Nothing  like  it.  Your  own 
statement  of  it  is,  that  if  the  Black  Republicans  elect 
a  President,  you  won't  stand  it !  You  will  break  up 
the  Union.  That  will  be  your  act,  not  ours.  To  jus- 
tify it,  you  must  show  that  our  policy  gives  you  just 
cause  far  such  desperate  action.  Can  you  do  that  ? 
When  you  attempt  it,  you  will  find  that  our  policy  is 
exactly  the  policy  of  the  men  who  made  the  Union. 
Nothing  more  and  nothing  less.  Do  you  really  think 


104  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

you  are  justified  to  break  the  government  rather  than 
have  it  administered  as  it  was  by  Washington,  and 
other  great  and  good  men  who  made  it,  and  first 
administered  it  ?  If  you  do,  you  are  very  unreason- 
able, and  more  reasonable  men  cannort  and  will  not 
submit  to  you.  While  you  elect  Presidents  we  submit, 
neither  breaking  nor  attempting  to  break  up  the 
Union.  If  we  shall  constitutionally  elect  a  President, 
it  will  be  our  duty  to  see  that  you  also  submit.-  Old 
John  Brown  has  been  executed  for  treason,  against  a 
State.  We  cannot  object,  even  though  he  agreed  with 
us  in  thinking  slavery  wrong.  That  cannot  excuse 
violence,  bloodshed,  and  treason.  It  could  avail  him 
nothing  that  he  might  think  himself  right.  So,  if 
constitutionally  we  elect  a  President,  and,  therefore, 
you  undertake  to  destroy  the  Union,  it  will  be  our 
duty  to  deal  with  you  as  old  John  Brown  has  been 
dealt  with.  We  shall  try  to  do  our  duty.  We  hope 
and  believe  that  in  no  section  will  a  majority  so  act  as 
to  render  such  extreme  measures  necessary." 

Mr.  Lincoln  is  described  by  one  who  is  familiar  with 
his  appearance  and  manners,  as  follows  : 

"  Mr.  Lincoln  stands  six  feet  and  four  inches  high  in 
his  stockings.  His  frame  is  not  muscular,  but  gaunt 
and  wiry  ;  his  arms  are  long,  but  not  unreasonably  so 
for  a  person  of  his  height ;  his  lower  limbs  are  not  dis- 
proportioned  to  his  body.  In  walking,  his  gait,  though 
firm,  is  never  brisk.  He  steps  slowly  and  deliberately, 
almost  always  with  his  head  inclined  forward,  and  his 
hands  clasped  behind  his  back.  In  matters  of  dress 
-  he  is  by  no  means  precise.  Always  clean,  he  is  never 
fashionable  ;  he  is  careless,  but  not  slovenly.  In  man- 
ner he  is  remarkably  cordial,  and,  at  the  same  time, 
simple.  His  politeness  is  always  sincere,  but  never 
elaborate  and  oppressive.  A  warm  shake  of  the  hand, 
and  a  warmer  smile  of  recognition,  are  his  methods  of 
greeting  his  friends.  At  rest,  his  features,  though 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN.  105 

those  of  a  man  of  mark,  are  not  such  as  belong  to  a 
handsome  man  ;  but  when  his  fine  dark  gray  eyes  are 
lighted  up  by  any  emotion,  and  his  features  begin  their 
play,  he  would  be  chosen  "from  among  a  crowd  as  one 
who  had  in  him  not  only  the  kindly  sentiments  which 
women  love,  but  the  heavier  metal  of  which  full-grown 
men  and  Presidents  are  made.  His  hair  is  black,  and 
though  thin  is  wiry.  His  head  sits  well  on  his  shoulders, 
but  beyond  that  it  defies  description.  It  nearer  resem- 
bles that  of  Clay  than  that  of  Webster  ;  but  it  is 
unlike  either.  It  is  very  large,  and,  phrenologically, 
well  proportioned,  betokening  power  in  all  its  develop- 
ments. A  slightly  Koman  nose,  a  wide-cut  mouth, 
and  a  dark  complexion,  with  the  appearance  of  having 
been  weather-beaten,  complete  the  description. 

"  In  his  personal  habits,  Mr.  Lincoln  is  as  simple  as 
a  child.  He  loves  a  good  dinner,  and  eats  with  the  ap- 
petite which  goes  with  a  great  brain  ;  but  his  food  is 
plain  and  nutritious.  He  never  drinks  intoxicating 
liquors  of  any  sort,  not  even  a  glass  of  wine.  He  is 
not  addicted  to  tobacco  in  any  of  its  shapes.  He  never 
was  accused  of  a  licentious  act  in  all  his  life.  He 
never  uses  profane  language. 

"  A  friend  says  that  once,  when  in  a  towering  rage, 
in  consequence  of  the  efforts  of  certain  parties  to  per- 
petrate a  fraud  on  the  State,  he  was  heard  to  say  : 
1  They  sha'n't  do  it,  d — n  'em  !'  but  beyond  an  expres- 
sion of  that  kind,  his  bitterest  feelings  never  carry  him. 
-He  never  gambles  ;  we  doubt  if  he  ever  indulges  in 
any  games  of  chance.  He  is  particularly  cautious 
about  incurring  pecuniary  obligations  for  any  purpose 
whatever,  and  in  debt,  he  is  never  content  until  the 
score  is  discharged.  We  presume  he  owes  no  man  a 
dollar.  He  never  speculates.  The  rage  for  the  sudden 
acquisition  of  wealth  never  took  hold  of  him.  His 
gains  from  his  profession  have  been  moderate,  but  suffi- 
cient for  his  purposes.  While  others  have  dreamed  of 
gold,  he  has  been  in  pursuit  of  knowledge.  In  all  his 

5* 


106  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

dealings  he  has  the  reputation  of  being  generous  but 
exact,  and,  above  all,  religiously  honest.  He  would  be 
a  bold  man  who  would  say  that  Abraham  Lincoln  ever 
wronged  any  one  out  of  a  cent,  or  ever  spent  a  dollar 
that  he  had  not  honestly  earned.  His  struggles  in  early 
life  have  made  him  careful  of  money  ;  but  his  gener- 
osity with  his  own  is  proverbial.  He  is  a  regular 
attendant  upon  religious  worship,  and  though  not  a 
communicant,  is  a  pew-holder  and  liberal  supporter  of 
the  Presbyterian  Church,  in  Springfield,  to  which  Mrs. 
Lincoln  belongs.  He  is  a  scrupulous  teller  of  the 
truth — too  exact  in  his  notions  to  suit  the  atmosphere 
of  Washington,  as  it  now  is.  His  enemies  may  say 
that  he  tells  Black  Republican  lies  ;  but  no  man  ever 
charged  that,  in  a  professional  capacity,  or  as  a  citizen 
dealing  with  his  neighbors,  he  would  depart  from  the 
Scriptural  command.  At  home,  he  lives  like  a  gentle- 
man of  modest  means  and  simple  tastes.  A  good-sized 
house  of  wood,  simply  but  tastefully  furnished,  sur- 
rounded by  trees  and  flowers,  is  his  own,  and  there  he 
lives,  at  peace  with  himself,  the  idol  of  his  family,  and 
for  his  honesty,  ability,  and  patriotism,  the  admiration 
of  his  countrymen." 

Another  person  gives  the  subjoined  sketch  of  him  : 

"  In  personal  appearance,  Mr.  Lincoln,  or,  as  he  is 
more  familiarly  termed  among  those  who  know  him 
best,  '  Old  Uncle  Abe/  is  long,  lean,  and  wiry.  In 
motion  he  has  a  great  deal  of  the  elasticity  and  awk- 
wardness which  indicate  the  rough  training  of  his  early 
life,  and  his  conversation  savors  strongly  of  Western 
idioms  and  pronunciation.  His  height  is  six  feet  four 
inches.  His  complexion  is  about  that  of  an  octoroon  ; 
his  face,  without  being  by  any  means  beautiful,  is  ge- 
nial looking,  and  good  humor  seems  to  lurk  in  every 
corner  of  its  innumerable  angles.  He  has  dark  hair 
tinged  with  gray,  a  good  forehead,  small  eyes,  a  long 
penetrating  nose,  with  nostrils  such  as  Napoleon  al* 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  107 

ways  liked  to  find  in  his"  best  generals,  because  they 
indicated  a  long  head  and  clear  thoughts  ;  and  a 
mouth,  which,  aside  from  being  of  magnificent  propor- 
tions, is  probably  the  most  expressive  feature  of  his 
face. 

"  As  a  speaker  he  is  ready,  precise,  and  fluent.  His 
manner  before  a  popular  assembly  is  as  he  pleases  to 
make  it,  being  either  superlatively  ludicrous,  or  very 
impressive.  He  employs  but  little  gesticulation,  but 
when  he  desires  to  make  a  point,  produces  a  shrug  of 
his  shoulders,  an  elevation  of  his  eyebrows,  a  depres- 
sion of  his  mouth,  and  a  general  malformation  of  coun- 
tenance so  comically  awkward  that  it  never  fails  to 
1  bring  down  the  house/  His  enunciation  is  slow  and 
emphatic,  and  his  v.oice,  though  sharp  and  powerful, 
at  times  has  a  frequent  tendency  to  dwindle  into  a 
shrill  and  unpleasant  sound  ;  but  as  before  stated,  the 
peculiar  characteristic  of  his  delivery  is  the  remarkable 
mobility  of  his  features,  the  frequent  contortions  of 
which  excite  ti  merriment  his  words  could  not  pro-, 
duce." 

A  good  story  is  told  of  Mr.  Lincoln  in  connection 
with  the  Harper's  Ferry  affair — and  by  the  way  it  is 
but  one  of  a  thousand  which  might  be  told  of  him,  for 
he  is  a  rare  story-teller — it  is  said  that  when  he  first 
heard  of  the  Harper's  Ferry  invasion,  he  remarked, 
that  it  was  "  a  shocking  and  lamentable  occurrence  ;" 
but  foreseeing  the  capital  which  the  democracy  would 
make  out  of  it,  he  added,  "  I  do  not  think  the  democ- 
racy can  cross  the  river  of  their  difficulties  at  Harper's 
Ferry." 

We  subjoin  another  amusing  one  from  a  Chicago 
journal  : 

"A  great  deal  of  fun  was  had  by  the  jokers  in 
Springfieid,  about  an  affair  in  which,  long  time  ago, 


108  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES    OF 

our  good  friend  Lincoln,  the  candidate  for  the  Presi- 
dency, was  engaged.     A  young  lady  of  that  city,  now 
the  wife  of  a  distinguished  statesman,  wrote  a  para- 
graph in  a  burlesque  vein,  for  the  Bangamon  Journal, 
in  which  Gen.  Shields  was  good  humoredly  ridiculed 
for  his  connection  with  some  public  measure,     The 
General  was  greatly  incensed,  and   demanded  of  the 
editor  the  name  of  the  offending  party.     '  Old  Sim'  put 
him  off  with  a  request  for  twenty-four  hours  to  con- 
sider the  matter,  and,  shortly  afterward  meeting  Lin- 
coln, told  him  his  perplexity.     '  Tell  him  I  wrote  it/ 
said  Lincoln  ;  and  tell  him  he  did.     After  a  deal  of 
diplomacy  to  get  a  retraction  of  the  offensive  parts  of 
the  paragraph  in  question,  Shields  sent  a  challenge, 
which  Lincoln   accepted,  named  broadswords   as  the 
weapons,  and  an  unfrequented,  well- wooded  island  in 
the  Mississippi,  just  below  Alton,  as  the  place.     '  Old 
Abe'  was  first  on  the  ground,  and  when  Shields  arrived 
he  found  his  antagonist,  his  sword  in  one  hand  and  a 
>  hatchet  in  the  other,  with  his  coat  off,  clearing  away 
the   underbrush  !      Before   the  preliminary  arrange- 
ments were  completed,  John  J.  Hardin,  who,  somehow, 
had  got   wind  of  what  was  afloat,  appeared  on  the 
scene,  called  them  both  d — d  fools,  and  by  his  argu- 
ments, addressed  to  their  common  sense,  and  by  his 
ridicule  of  the  figure  that  they,  two  well-grown,  beard- 
ed men,  were  making  there,  each  with  a  frog-sticker  in 
his  hand,  broke  up  the  fight.     We  do  not  know  how 
Gen.  Shields  feels,  but  we  have  heard  of  Lincoln's  say- 
ing, that  the  acceptance  of  the  challenge  was  the  mean- 
est thing  he  ever  did  in  his  life.     Hardin — than  whom 
a  braver  man  never  stood — never  came  out  of  that  ter- 
rible charge  at  Buena  Vista,  to  which  he  led  the  Second 
Eegiment  of  Illinois  Volunteers.     If  the  events  of  his 
life  passed  in  quick  review  before  his  mind,  as  he  lay 
wounded  and  dying  in  that  fatal  ravine,  we  doubt  not 
this  act  of  his,  by  which  he  prevented  two  really  brave 
men  from  engaging  in  fatal  strife,  was  not  the  least  of 
the  consolations  of  that  bitter  hour.'' 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN. 


109 


"  While  the  late  Illinois  State  Kepublican  Conven- 
tion was  in  session,  the  Hon.  Abraham  Lincoln  stepped 
in  to  witness  the  proceedings.  His  appearance  was 
greeted  with  the  utmost  enthusiasm.  He  had  hardly 
taken  his  seat  when  Mr.  Oglesby  of  Decatur  announced 
to  the  delegates  that  an  old  Democrat  of  Macon  coun- 
ty, who  had  grown  gray  in  the  service  of  that  party 
desired  to  make  a  contribution  to  the  Convention,  and 
the  offer  being  accepted,  forthwith  two  old-time  fence 
rails,  decorated  with  flags  and  streamers,  were  borne 
through  the  crowd  into  the  Convention,  bearing  the  in- 
scription : 


ABEAHAM  LINCOLN, 

The  Rail  Candidate 
FOR   PRESIDENT   IN   I860. 

Two  rails  from  a  lot  of  3,000  made  in  1830, 
by  Thos.  Hanks  and  Abe  Lincoln  — whose 
father  was  the  first  pioneer  of  Macon  County. 


"  The  effect  was  electrical.  One  spontaneous  burst 
of  applause  went  up  from  all  parts  of  the  l  wigwam/ 
which  grew  more  and  more  deafening  as  it  was  pro- 
longed, and  which  did  not  wholly  subside  for  ten  or  fif- 
teen minutes  after.  The  cheers  upon  cheers  which 
rent  the  air  could  have  been  heard  all  over  the  adjacent 
country.  Of  course  '  Old  Abe'  was  called  out,  and 
made  an  explanation  of  the  matter.  He  stated  that, 
some  thirty  years  ago,  then  just  emigrating  to  the 
State,  he  stopped  with  his  mother's  family,  for  one 
season,  in  what  is  now  Macon  county  ;  that  he  built  a 
cabin,  split  rails,  and  cultivated  a  small  farm  down  on 
the  Sangamon  river,  some  six  or  eight  miles  from 


110  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES    OP 

Decatur.  These,  lie  was  informed,  were  taken  from 
that  fence  ;  but,  whether  they  were  or  not,  he  had 
mauled  many  and  many  better  ones  since  he  had  grown 
to  manhood.  The  cheers  were  renewed  with  the  same 
vigor  when  he  concluded  his  remarks." 

A  Western  Kepublican  relates  the  following  thrilling 
episode  in  the  life  of  Mr.  Lincoln  :  "  Mr.  Lincoln,  or 
'  Old  Abe/  as  his  friends  familiarly  call  him,  is  a  self- 
made  man.  A  Kentuckian  by  birth,  he  emigrated  to 
Illinois  in  his  boyhood,  where  he  earned  his  living  at 
the  anvil,  devoting  his  leisure  hours  to  study.  Having 
chosen  the  law  as  his  future  calling,  he  devoted  himself 
assiduously  to  its  mastery,  contending  at  every  step 
with  adverse  fortune.  During  this  period  of  study,  he 
for  some  time  found  a  home  under  the  hospitable  roof 
of  one  Armstrong,  a  farmer,  who  lived  in  a  log-house 
some  eight  miles  from  the  village  of  Petersburg,  Me- 
nard  county.  Here,  clad  in  homespun,  with  elbows 
out,  and  knees  covered  with  patches,  young  Lincoln 
would  master  his  lessons  by  the  firelight  of  the  cabin, 
and  then  walk  to  town  for  the  purpose  of  recitation. 
This  man  Armstrong  was  himself  poor,  but  he  saw  the 
genius  struggling  in  the  young  student,  and  opened  to 
him  his  rude  home,  and  bid  him  welcome  to  his  coarse 
fare.  How  Lincoln  graduated  with  promise,  how  he 
has  more  than  fulfilled  that  promise,  how  honorably  he 
acquitted  himself  alike  on  the  battle-field,  in  defending 
our  border  settlements  against  the  ravages  of  the  savage 
foes,  and  in  the  halls  of  our  national  legislature,  are 
matters  of  history,  and  need  no  repetition  here.  But 
one  little  incident  of  a  m6re  private  nature,  standing 
as  it  does  as  a  sort  of  sequel  to  some  things  already 


ABKAHAM    LINCOLN.  Ill 

alluded  to,  I  deem  worthy  of  record.  Some  few  years 
since  the  oldest  son  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  old  friend  Arm- 
strong, the  chief  support  of  his  widowed  mother — the 
good  old  man  having  some  time  previously  passed  from 
earth — was  arrested  on  the  charge  of  murder.  A  young 
man  had  been  killed  during  a  riotous  melee,  in  the 
night-time,  at  a  camp-meeting,  and  one  of  his  asso- 
ciates stated  that  the  death-wound  was  inflicted  by 
young  Armstrong.  A  preliminary  examination  was 
gone  into,  at  which  the  accuser  testified  so  positively 
that  there  seemed  no  doubt  of  the  guilt  of  the  prisoner, 
and,  therefore,  he  was  held  for  trial.  As  is  too  often 
the  case,  the  bloody  act  caused  an  undue  degree  of  ex- 
citement in  the  public  mind.  Every  improper  incident 
in  the  life  of  the  prisoner — each  act  which  bore  the 
least  semblance  to  rowdyism — each  school-boy  quarrel 
— was  suddenly  remembered  and  magnified,  until  they 
pictured  him  as  a  fiend  of  the  most  horrid  hue.  As 
these  rumors  spread  abroad,  they  were  received  as 
gospel  truth,  and  a.  feverish  desire  for  vengeance  seized 
upon  the  infatuated  populace,  while  only  prison-bars 
prevented  a  horrible  death  at  the  hands  of  a  mob. 
The  events  were  heralded  in  the  county  papers,  painted 
in  the  highest  colors,  accompanied  by  rejoicings  over 
the  certainty  of  punishment  being  meted  out  to  the 
guilty  party.  The  prisoner,  overwhelmed  by  the 
circumstances  under  which  he  found  himself  placed, 
fell  into  a  melancholy  condition,  bordering  upon  de- 
spair ;  and  the  widowed  mother,  looking  through  her 
tears,  saw  no  cause  for  hope  from  earthly  aid. 

"  At  this  juncture,  the  widow  received  a  letter  from 
Mr.  Lincoln,  volunteering  his  services  in  an  eifort  to 


112  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

save  the  youth  from  the  impending  stroke.  Gladly  was 
his  aid  accepted,  although  it  seemed  impossible  for 
even  his  sagacity  to  prevail  in  such  a  desperate  case  ; 
but  the  heart  of  the  attorney  was  in  his  work,  and  he 
set  about  it  with  a  will  that  knew  no  such  word  as  fail. 
Feeling  that  the  poisoned  condition  of  the  public  mind 
was  such  as  to  preclude  the  possibility  of  impanelling 
an  impartial  jury  in  the  court  having  jurisdiction,  he 
procured  a  change  of  venue,  and  a  ppstponement  of  the 
trial.  He  then  went  studiously  to  work  unravelling  the 
history  of  the  case,  and  satisfied  himself  that  his  client 
was  the  victim  of  malice,  and  that  the  statement  of 
the  accuser  was  a  tissue  of  falsehoods. 

"  When  the  trial  was  called  on,  the  prisoner,  pale  and 
emaciated,  with  hopelessness  written  on  every  feature, 
and  accompanied  by  his  half-hoping,  half-despairing 
mother — whose  only  hope  was  a  mother's  belief  of  her 
son's  innocence,  in  the  justice  of  the  God  she  worship- 
ped, and  in  the  noble  counsel,  who,  without  hope  of  fee 
or  reward  upon  earth,  had  undertaken  the  cause — took 
his  seat  in  the  prisoner's  box,  and  with  a  '  stony  firm- 
ness' listened  to  the  reading  of  the  indictment.  Lin- 
coln sat  quietly  by,  while  the  large  auditory  looked  on 
him  as  though  wondering  what  he  eould  say  in  defence 
of  one  whose  guilt  they  regarded  as  certain.  The  ex- 
amination of  witnesses  for  the  State  was  begun,  and  a 
well-arranged  mass  of  evidence,  circumstantial  and  pos- 
itive, was  introduced,  which  seemed  to  impale  the  pris- 
oner beyond  the  possibility  of  extrication.  The  coun- 
sel for  the  defence  propounded  but  few  questions,  and 
those  of  a  character  which  excited  no  uneasiness  on  the 
part  of  the  prosecutor — merely,  in  most  cases,  requir- 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  113 

ing  the  main  witness  to  be  definite  as  to  time  and  place. 
When  the  evidence  of  the  prosecution  was  ended,  Lin- 
coln introduced  a  few  witnesses  to  remove  some  errone- 
ous impressions  in  regard  to  the  previous  character  of 
his  client,  who,  though  somewhat  rowdyish,  had  never 
been  known  to  commit  a  vicious  act ;  and  to  show  that 
*  a  greater  degree  of  ill-feeling  existed  between  the  accu- 
ser and  accused  than  the  accused  and  the  deceased. 
The  prosecutor  felt  that  the  case  was  a  clear  one,  and 
his  opening  speech  was  brief  and  formal.  Lincoln 
arose,  while  a  deathly  silence  pervaded  the  vast  audi- 
ence, and  in  a  clear  but  moderate  tone  began  his  argu- 
ment. Slowly  and  carefully  he  reviewed  the  testimony, 
pointing  out  the  hitherto  unobserved  decrepancies  in 
the  statements  of  the  principal  witness.  That  which 
had  seemed  plain  and  plausible,  he  made  to  appear 
crooked  as  a  serpent's  path.  The  witness  had  stated 
that  the  affair  took  place  at  a  certain  hour  in  the  even- 
ing, and  that,  by  the  aid  of  the  brightly  shining  moon, 
he  saw  the  prisoner  inflict  the  death  blow  with  a  slung- 
shot.  Mr.  Lincoln  showed  that  at  the  hour  referred  to, 
the  moon  had  not  yet  appeared  above  the  horizon,  and 
consequently  the  whole  tale  was  a  fabrication.  An  al- 
most instantaneous  change  seemed  to  have  been  wrought 
in  the  minds  of  his  auditors,  and  the  verdict  of  '  not 
guilty'  was  at  the  end  of  every  tongue.  But  the  advo- 
cate was  not  content  with  this  intellectual  achievement. 
His  whole  being  had  for  months  been  bound  up  in  this 
work  of  gratitude  and  mercy,  and,  as  the  lava  of  the 
overcharged  crater  bursts  from  its  imprisonment,  so 
great  thoughts  and  burning  words  leaped  forth  from 
the  soul  of  the  eloquent  Lincoln.  He  drew  a  picture 


114  LIFE    AND    SPEECHES    OF 

of  the  perjurer  so  horrid  and  ghastly  that  the  accuser 
could  sit  under  it  no  longer,  but  reeled  and  staggered 
from  the  court-room,  while  the  audience  fancied  they 
could  see  the  brand  upon  his  brow.  Then  in  words  of 
thrilling  pathos,  Lincoln  appealed  to  the  jurors  as  fa- 
thers of  sons  who  might  become  fatherless,  and  as  hus- 
bands of  wives  who  might  be  widowed,  to  yield  to  no 
previous  impressions,  no  ill-founded  prejudice,  but  to 
do  his  client  justice  ;  and  as  he  alluded  to  the  debt  of 
gratitude  which  he  owed  to  the  boy's  sire,  tears  were 
seen  to  fall  from  many  eyes  unused  to  weep.  It  was 
near  night  when  he  concluded  by  saying  that,  if  justice 
were  done — as  he  believed  it  would  be — before  the  sun 
should  set,  it  would  shine  upon  his  client  a  free  man. 
The  jury  retired,  and  the  court  adjourned  for  the  day. 
Half  an  hour  had  not  elapsed,  when,  as  the  officers  of 
the  court  and  the  volunteer  attorney  sat  at  the  tea-ta- 
ble of  their  hotel,  a  messenger  announced  that  the  jury 
had  returned  to  their  seats.  All  repaired  immediately 
to  the  court-house,  and  while  the  prisoner  was  being 
brought  from  the  jail,  the  court-room  was  filled  to 
overflowing  with  citizens  of  the  town.  When  the  pris- 
oner and  his  mother  entered,  silence  reigned  as  com- 
pletely as  though  the  house  was  empty.  The  foreman 
of  the  jury,  in  answer  to  the  usual  inquiry  of  the 
court,  delivered  the  verdict  of  '  Not  Guilty  !'  The 
widow  dropped  into  the  arms  of  her  son,  who  lifted  her 
up,  and  told  her  to  look  upon  him  as  before — free  and 
innocent.  Then,  with  the  words,  '  Where  is  Mr.  Lin- 
coln ?'  he  rushed  across  the  room  and  grasped  the  hand 
of  his  deliverer,  while  his  heart  was  too  full  for  utter- 
ance. Lincoln  turned  his  eyes  toward  the  West,  where 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  115 

the  sun  still  lingered  in  view,  and  then,  turning  to  the 
youth,-  said,  '  It  is  not  yet  sundown,  and  you  are  free/ 
'I  confess  that  my  cheeks  were  not  wholly  unwet  by 
tears,  and  I  turned  from  the  affecting  scene.  As  I  cast 
a  glance  behind,  I  saw  Abraham  Lincoln  obeying  the 
divine  injunction  by  comforting  the  widowed  and  the 
fatherless." 

In  May,  1859,  Mr.  Lincoln  wrote  the  subjoined  let- 
ter to  a  German  citizen  of  Illinois.  The  letter  speaks 
for  itself,  and  needs  no  comment  : 

"  SPEINGFIELD,  May  17,  1859. 

"  Dear  Sir — Your  letter,  in  which  you  inquire,  on 
your  own  account  and  in  behalf  of  certain  other  Ger- 
man citizens,  whether  I  approve  or  oppose  the  consti- 
tutional provision  in  relation  to  naturalized  citizens 
which  was  lately  enacted  in  Massachusetts,  and  whether 
I  favor  or  oppose  a  fusion  of  the  Bepublicans  with  the 
other  Opposition  elements  in  the  campaign  of  1860, 
has  been  received. 

"  Massachusetts  is  a  sovereign  and  independent  State, 
and  I  hav'e  no  right  to  advise  her  in  her  policy.  Yet, 
if  any  one  is  desirous  to  draw  a  conclusion  as  to  what 
I  would  do  from  what  she  has  done,  I  may  speak  with- 
out impropriety.  I  say,  then,  that  so  far  as  I  understand 
the  Massachusetts  provision,  I  am  against  its  adoption, 
not  only  in  Illinois,  but  in  every  other  place  in  which 
I  have  the  right  to  oppose  it.  As  I  understand  the 
spirit  of  our  institutions,  it  is  designed  to  promote  the 
elevation  of  men.  I  am,  therefore,  hostile  to  anything 
that  tends  to  their  debasement.  It  is  well  known  that 
I  deplore  the  oppressed  condition  of  the  blacks,  and  it 
would,  therefore,  be  very  inconsistent  for  me  to  look 
with  approval  upon  any  measure  that  infringes  upon 
the  inalienable  rights  of  white  men,  whether  or  not  they 
are  born  in  another  land  or  speak  a  different  language 
from  our  own. 


116  LIFE    AND    SPEECHES    OP 

"  In  respect  to  a  fusion,  I  am  in  favor  of  it  whenevei 
it  can  be  effected  on  Republican  principles,  but  upon 
no  other  condition.  A  fusion  upon  any  other  platform 
would  be  as  insane  as  unprincipled.  It  would  thereby 
lose  the  whole  North,  while  the  common  enemy  would 
still  have  the  support  of  the  entire  South.  The  ques- 
tion in  relation  to  men  is  different.  There  are  good 
and  patriotic  men  and  able  statesmen  in  the  South 
whom  I  would  willingly  support  if  they  would  place 
themselves  on  Eepublican  ground  ;  but  I  shall  oppose 
the  lowering  of  the  Republican  standard  even  by  a 
hair' s-breadth. 

"  I  have  written  in  haste,  but  I  believe  I  have  an- 
swered your  questions  substantially. 

"  Respectfully,  yours, 

"  ABRAHAM  LINCOLN. 

"DR.  THEODOR  CANISIUS." 

"  We  have  heard/'  says  the  The  Evansville  (Ind.) 
Journal,  "  the  following  anecdote  related  of  the  people's 
candidate  for  the  Presidency,  which  shows  the  love  of 
knowledge,  the  industry,  the  conscientiousness,  and  the 
integrity  of  the  subject  of  this  sketch  : 

"  It  is  well  known  that  he  lived  in  Spencer  county, 
above  here  in  Indiana,  in  his  young  days.  He  was  a 
hard-working  lad,  and  very  eager  in  his  thirst  for 
knowledge.  A  man,  named  Crawford,  owned  a  copy 
of  Weems's  Life  of  Washington — the  only  one  in  the 
whole  neighborhood.  Young  Lincoln  borrowed  that 
interesting  book  (not  having  money  to  spare  to  buy 
one),  and  while  reading  it,  by  a  slight  negligence,  left 
it  in  a  window,  when  a  rain-storm  came  up  and  wet  the 
book  so  as  to  ruin  it.  Young  Lincoln  felt  badly,  but, 
like  an  honest  boy,  he  went  to  Mr.  Crawford  with  the 
ruined  book,  acknowledged  his  accountability  for  its 
destruction,  and  his  willingness  to  make  due  compensa- 
tion. He  said  he  had  no  money,  but  would  work  out 
the  value  of  the  book. 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  117 

"  The  owner  of  the  book  said  to  him,  'Well,  Abe, 
being  as  it's  you,  I  won't  be  hard  on  you.  If  you  will 
come  over  and  pull  fodder  for  two  days,  I'll  let  you 
off.' 

"  Abe  went  over  accordingly,  and  pulled  fodder  the 
requisite  time  ;  and  so  tall  and  handy  a  lad  was  he, 
that  Crawford  required  him  to  pull  the  fodder  off  of 
the  tallest  stalks,  while  he  took  the  shortest  ones  him- 
self." 


118  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES    OF 


PART    FOURTH. 

THE    CONVENTION    AND    ITS    NOMINATIONS. 

ON  the  sixteenth  day  of  May  the  Republican  Na- 
tional Convention  met  at  Chicago  in  a  large  building 
put  up  for  the  purpose  arid  called  the  "  Wigwam." 

The  doors  were  opened  at  11  o'clock. 

Long  before  that  hour  the  concourse  of  people  as- 
sembled around  the  doors  numbered  many  thousands 
more  than  could  gain  admittance  to  the  building.  As 
soon  as  the  doors  were  opened  the  entire  body  of  the 
Wigwam  was  solidly  packed  with  men.  -  The  seats  in 
the  galleries  were  equally  closely  packed  with  ladies. 
The  interior  of  the  hall  was  handsomely  decorated  with 
( evergreen,  statuary,  and  flowers,  and  presented  a  strik- 
ing appearance.  There  were  not  less  than  ten  thousand 
persons  in  the  building,  while  the  open  doors  displayed 
to  view  crowds  in  the  streets  unable  to  obtain  more, 
than  a  glimpse  inside  of  the  hall. 

At  12  o'clock  the  Convention  was  called  to  order  by 
Gov.  Morgan  of  New- York,  Chairman  of  the  National 
Committee,  who  named  the  honorable  DAVID  WILMOT 
of  Pennsylvania  for  temporary  President. 

The  Chair  named  Judge  Marshall  of  Mel.,  and  Gov. 
Cleveland  of  Conn.,  to  conduct  Mr.  Wilmot  to  his  seat. 
Judge  Marshall  introduced  Mr.  Wilmot  as  the  man 
who  dared  to  do  right  regardless  of  consequences. 
With  such  a  man,  he  said,  there  is  no  such  word  as  fail. 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  119 

Mr.  WILMOT  addressed  the  Convention  briefly,  re- 
turning thanks  for  the  high  and  undeserved  honor. 
He  would  carry  the  remembrance  of  it  with  him  to  the 
day  of  his  death.  It  was  unnecessary  for  him  to  re- 
mind the  Convention  of  the  high  duty  devolved  upon 
them.  A  great  sectional  interest  had  for  years  domi- 
nated with  a  high  hand  over  the  affairs  of  the  country. 
It  had  bent  all  its  energy  to  the  extension  and  natural- 
ization of  slavery.  It  is  the  mission  of  the  Republican 
party  to  oppose  this  policy,  and  restore  to  the  govern- 
ment the  policy  of  the  Revolutionary  fathers  ;  to  resist 
the  dogma  that  slavery  exists  wherever  the  Constitu- 
tion extends  ;  to  read  the  Constitution  as  our  fathers 
read  it.  That  Constitution  was  not  ordained  to  em- 
brace slavery  within  all  the  limits  of  the  country. 
They  lived  and  died  in  the  faith  that  slavery  was  a  blot, 
and  would  soon  be  washed  out.  Had  they  deemed  that 
the  Revolution  was  to  establish  a  great  slave  empire, 
not  one  would  have  drawn  the  sword  in  such  a  cause. 
The  battle  was  fought  to  establish  freedom.  Slavery 
is  sectional — freedom  is  national.  [Applause.]  He 
deemed  it  unnecessary  to  remind  the  delegates  of  the 
outrages  and  usurpations  of  the  Democratic  party. 

Those  outrages  will  not  be  confined  to  the  limits  of 
the  slave  States  if  the  South  have  the  power,  and  the 
safety  of  the  free  States  requires  the  Republicans 
should  take  the  government,  and  administer  it  as  it 
has  been  administered  by  Washington,  Jefferson,  and 
Jackson — even  down  to  Van  Buren  and  Polk — before 
these  new  dogmas  were  engrafted  in  the  Democratic 
policy.  He  assumed  his  duties,  exhorting  a  spirit  of 
harmony  to  control  the  action  of  the  delegates. 


120 


LIFE    AND    SPEECHES    OF 


Committees  on  business  and  credentials  were  ap- 
pointed. In  the  afternoon  session,  the  Committee  on 
Organization  reported  the  name  of  George  Ashmun, 
of  Massachusetts,  for  President,  and  Vice-Presidents 
and  Secretaries  from  every  State  represented  in  the 
Convention.  The  subjoined  Committee  on  Resolutions 
was  appointed : 


Maine George  Talbot. 

New-Hampshire ....  Amos  Tuck. 

Vermont E.  M.  Briggs. 

Massachusetts.  ..G.  S.  Boutwcll. 

Rhode  Island B.  T.  Earner. 

Connecticut S.  W.  Kellogg. 

New-York Henry  K.  Selden. 

New-Jersey . .Thomas  S.  Dudley. 
Pennsylvania. . .  .William  Jessup. 

Ohio J.  II.  Barrett. 

Indiana William  T.   Otto. 

Illinois Gustavus   Koeler. 

Wisconsin Carl  Schurz. 


Iowa -John  A.  Kasson. 

Minnesota Stephen  Miller. 

Delaware N.  D.  Srnithers. 

Maryland F.  P.  Blair. 

Virginia Alfred   Caldwcll. 

Kentucky George  T.  Blakoly. 

Michigan Austin  Blair. 

Missouri Charles  M.  Bernais. 

California F.  P.  Tracy. 

Texas J.  Strauss. 

District  of  Columbia.. G.  A.  Hall. 

Nebraska A.  S.  Bradlock. 

Kansas J .  F .   Hntterscheidt 


On  Thursday  morning  the  Convention  met  at  ten 
o'clock.  The  greatest  enthusiasm  was  manifested,  both 
inside  and  outside  of  the  "  Wigwam."  The  entire  day 
was  consumed  in  the  consideration  of  the  proper  rules 
to  be  adopted  for  the  government  of  the  Convention, 
and  in  discussing  the  resolutions  reported  from  the 
Committee.  It  was  agreed  that  a  majority  should  nom- 
inate the  candidates.  The  following  resolutions  were 
adopted  by  the  Convention  as 

THE  PLATFOKM  OF  THE  REPUBLICAN  PARTY. 

"Resolved,  That  we,  the  delegated  representatives 
of  the  Republican  electors  of  the  United  States,  in 
Convention  assembled,  in  the  discharge  of  the  duty  we 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  121 

owe  to  our  constituents  and  our  country,  unite  in  the 
following  declarations  : 

"First :  That  the  history  of  the  nation  during  the 
last  four  years  has  fully  established  the  propriety  and 
necessity  of  the  organization  and  perpetuation  of  the 
Repablican  party,  and  that  the  causes  which  called  it 
into  existence  are  permanent  in  their  nature,  and  now, 
more  than  ever  before,  demand  its  peaceful  and  consti- 
tutional triumph. 

"  Second  :  That  the  maintenance  of  the  principles 
promulgated  in  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  arid 
embodied  in  the  Federal  Constitution,  is  essential  to 
the  preservation  of  our  republican  institutions  ;  that 
the  Federal  Constitution,  the  rights  of  the  States,  and 
the  Union  of  the  States,  must  and  shall  be  preserved  ; 
and  that  we  reassert  '  these  truths  to  be  self-evident, 
that  all  men  are  created  equal ;  that  they  are  endowed 
by  their  Creator  with  certain  inalienable  rights  ;  that 
among  these  are  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happi- 
ness. That  to  secure  these  rights,  governments  are 
instituted  among  men,  deriving  their  j  ust  powers  from 
the  consent  of  the  governed/ 

"  Third :  That  to  the  Union  of  the  States  this 
nation  owes  its  unprecedented  increase  in  population  ; 
its  surprising  development  of  material  resources  ;  its 
rapid  augmentation  of  wealth  ;  its  happiness  at  home, 
and  its  honor  abroad  ;  and  we  hold  in  abhorrence  all 
schemes  for  disunion,  come  from  whatever  source  they 
may  ;  and  we  congratulate  the  country  that  no  Repub- 
lican member  of  Congress  has  uttered  or  countenanced 
a  threat  of  disunion,  so  often  made  by  Democratic 
members  of  Congress  without  rebuke,  and  with  ap- 
plause from  their  political  associates  ;  and  we  denounce 
those  threats  of  disunion,  in  case  of  a  popular  over- 
throw of  their  ascendency,  as  denying  the  vital  princi- 
ples of  a  free  government,  and  as  an  avowal  of  con- 
templated treason,  which  it  is  the  imperative  duty  of  an 
indignant  people  strongly  to  rebuke  and  forever  silence. 

6 


122  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

Fourth :  That  the  maintenance  inviolate  of  the 
rights  of  the  States,  and  especially  the  right  of  each 
State  to  order  and  control  its  own  domestic  institu- 
tions, according  to  its  own  judgment  exclusively,  is 
essential  to  that  balance  of  power  on  which  the  perfec- 
tion and  endurance  of  our  political  faith  depends,  and 
we  denounce  the  lawless  invasion  by  armed  force  of  any 
State  or  Territory,  no  matter  under  what  pretext,  as 
among  the  gravest  of  crimes. 

"Fifth:  That  the  present  Democratic  administra- 
tion has  far  exceeded  our  worst  apprehensions  in  its 
measureless  subserviency  to  the  exactions  of  a  sectional 
interest,  as  is  especially  evident  in  its  desperate  exer- 
tions to  force  the  infamous  Lecompton  Constitution 
upon  the  protesting  people  of  Kansas — in  construing 
the  personal  relation  between  master  and  servant  to 
involve  an  unqualified  property  in  persons — in  its  at- 
tempted enforcement  everywhere,  on  land  and  sea, 
through  the  intervention  of  Congress  and  the  Federal 
Courts,  of  the  extreme  pretensions  of  a  purely  local 
interest,  and  in  its  general  and  unvarying  abuse  of  the 
power  intrusted  to  it  by  a  confiding  people. 

"  Sixth  :  That  the  people  justly  view  with  alarm  the 
reckless  extravagance  which  pervades  every  department 
of  the  federal  government ;  that  a  return  to  rigid 
economy  and  accountability  is  indispensable  to  arrest 
the  system  of  plunder  of  the  public  treasury  by  favored 
partisans  ;  while  the  recent  startling  developments  of 
fraud  and  .corruption  at  the  federal  metropolis,  show 
that  an  entire  change  of  administration  is  imperatively 
demanded. 

"  Seventh :  That  the  new  dogma  that  the  Constitu- 
tion, of  its  own  force,  carries  slavery  into  any  or  all  the 
territories  of  the  United  States,  is  a  dangerous  political 
heresy,  at  variance  with  the  explicit  provisions  of  that 
instrument  itself,  with  cotemporaneous  expositions,  and 
with  legislative  and  judicial  precedent,  is  revolutionary 
in  its  tendency,  and  subversive  of  the  peace  and  har- 
mony of  the  country. 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN 


"Eighth  :  That  the  normal  condition  of  all  the  terri- 
tory of  the  United  States  is  that  of  freedom  ;  that  as 
our  republican  fathers,  wh«n  they  had  abolished  slavery 
in  all  our  national  territory,  ordained  that  no  person 
should  be  deprived  of  life,  liberty,  or  property,  without 
the  process  of  law,  it  becomes  our  duty,  by  legislation, 
whenever  such  legislation  is  necessary,  to  maintain  this 
provision  of  the  Constitution  against  all  attempts  to 
violate  it ;  and  we  deny  the  authority  of  Congress,  of  a 
territorial  legislature,  or  of  any  individuals,  to  give 
legal  existence  to  slavery  in  any  territory  of  the  United 
States. 

"Ninth  :  That  we  brand  the  recent  re-opening  of  the 
African  slave-trade,  under  the  cover  of  our  national 
flag,  aided  by  perversions  of  judicial  power,  as  a  crime 
against  humanity,  a  burning  shame  to  our  country  and 
age  ;  and  we  call  upon  Congress  to  take  prompt  and 
efficient  measures  for  the  total  and  final  suppression  of 
that  execrable  traffic. 

11  Tenth  :  That  in  the  recent  vetoes  by  their  federal 
governors,  of  the  acts  of  the  legislatures  of  Kansas  and 
Nebraska,  prohibiting  slavery  in  those  territories,  we 
find  a  practical  illustration  of  the  boasted  democratic 
principle  of  non-intervention  and  Popular  Sovereignty, 
embodied  in  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill,  and  a  de- 
nunciation of  the  deception  and  fraud  involved  therein. 

"Eleventh  :  That  Kansas  should  of  right  be  immedi- 
ately admitted  as  a  State,  under  the  constitution  re- 
cently formed  and  adopted  by  her  people,  and  accepted 
by  the  House  of  ^Representatives. 

"Twelfth  :  That  while  providing  revenue  for  the  sup- 
port of  the  general  government  by  duties  upon  imposts, 
sound  policy  requires  such  an  adjustment  of  these  im- 
posts as  to  encourage  the  development  of  the  industrial 
interest  of  the  whole  country,  and  we  commend  that 
policy  of  national  exchanges  which  secures  to  the  work- 
ing man  liberal  wages,  to  agriculture  remunerating 
prices,  to  mechanics  and  manufacturers  an  adequate 


124  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

reward  for  their  skill,  labor,  and  enterprise,  and  to  the 
nation  commercial  prosperity  and  independence. 

"Thirteenth:  That  we  protest  against  any  sale  or 
alienation  to  others  of  the  public  lands  held  by  actual 
settlers,  and  against  any  view  of  the  free  homestead 
policy  which  regards  the  settlers  a%  paupers  or  suppli- 
cants for  public  bounty';  and  we  demand  the  passage 
by  Congress  of  the  complete  and  satisfactory  homestead 
measure  which  has  already  passed  the  House. 

"Fourteenth  :  That  the  Republican  party  is  opposed 
to  any  change  in  our  naturalization  laws,  or  any  State 
legislation  by  which  the  rights  of  citizenship  hitherto 
accorded  to  immigrants  from  foreign  lands  shall  be 
abridged  or  impaired  ;  and  in  favor  of  giving  a  full  and 
efficient  protection  to  the  rights  of  all  classes  of  citizens, 
whether  native  or  naturalized,  both  at  home  and  abroad. 

"Fifteenth  :  That  appropriations  by  Congress  for 
river  and  harbor  improvements,  of  a  national  character, 
required  for  the  accommodation  and  security  of  an  ex- 
isting commerce,  are  authorized  by  the  Constitution 
and  justified  by  an  obligation  of  the  government  to  pro- 
tect the  lives  and  property  of  its  citizens. 

"  Sixteenth  :  That  a  railroad  to  the  Pacific  Ocean  is 
imperatively  demanded  by  the  interests  of  the  whole 
country  ;  that  the  federal  government  ought  to  render 
immediate  and  efficient  aid  in  its  construction,  and 
that,  as  preliminary  thereto,  a  daily  overland  mail 
should  be  promptly  established. 

"  Seventeenth  :  Finally,  having  thus  set  forth  our 
distinctive  principles  and  views,  we  invite  the  co-oper- 
ation of  all  citizens,  however  differing  on  other  ques- 
tions, who  substantially  agree  with  us  in  their  affirm- 
ance and  support." 

A  scene  of  the  wildest  excitement  followed  the  adop- 
tion of  the  platform,  the  immense  multitude  rising 
and  giving  round  after  round  of  applause  ;  ten  thou- 
sand voices  swelled  into  a  roar  so  deafening  that,  for 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  125 

several  minutes,  every  attempt  to  restore  order  was 
hopelessly  vain.  The  multitude  outside  took  up  and 
re-echoed  the  cheers,  making  the  scene  of  enthusiasm 
and  excitement  unparalleled  in  any  similar  gathering. 

On  Friday  morning  the  wigwam  was  closely  packed 
for  a  full  hour  before  the  Convention  assembled.  The 
interest  in  the  proceedings  appeared  on  the  increase  as 
the  time  for  balloting  approached.  A  crowd,  numbered 
by  thousands,  had  been  outside  the  building  since  nine 
o'clock,  anxiously  awaiting  intelligence  from  the  inside. 
Arrangements  had  been  made  for  passing  the  result  of 
the  ballots  up  from  the  platform  to  the  roof  of  the 
building,  and  through  the  skylight,  men  being  station- 
ed above  to  convey  speedily  the  intelligence  to  the  mul- 
titude in  the  streets. 

A  large  procession  was  formed  by  the  various  delega- 
tions, to  march  to  the  hall,  preceded  by  bands  of 
music. 

As  the  delegates  entered  on  the  platform  the  several 
distinguished  men  were  greeted  with  rounds  of  applause 
by  the  audience. 

The  Convention  then  voted  to  proceed  to  ballot  for 
a  candidate  for  President  of  the  United  States. 

Wm.  M.  Evarts,  of  New-York,  did  not  rise  for  the 
purpose  of  making  a  speech,  but  only  to  ask  if  at  this 
time  it  is  in  order  to  put  candidates  in  nomination. 

The  President  :  The  Chair  considers  it  in  order  to 
name  candidates  without  debate. 

Wm.  M.  Evarts  rose  and  said— I  beg  leave  to  offer 
the  name  of  Wm.  H.  Seward  as  a  candidate  before  this 
Convention,  for  the  nomination  of  President  of  the 
United  States. 


126  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

This  nomination  was  received  with  loud  and  long- 
continued  applause. 

Mr.  Judd,  of  Illinois,  rose  and  said  :  Mr.  President, 
I  beg  leave  to  offer,  as  a  candidate  before  this  Conven- 
tion for  President  of  the  United  States,  the  name  of 
Abraham  Lincoln,  of  Illinois. 

The  crowded  audience  greeted  this  nomination  with 
perfectly  deafening  applause,  the  shouts  swelling  into 
a  perfect  roar,  and  being  continued  for  several  minutes, 
the  wildest  excitement  and  enthusiasm  prevailing. 

Mr.  Dudley,  of  New-Jersey,  presented  the  name  of 
Wm.  L.  Dayton. 

Gov.  Keeder,  of  Pennsylvania  :  The  State  of  Penn- 
sylvania desires  to  present,  as  her  candidate,  the  name 
of  Simon  Cameron. 

Mr.  Carter,  of  Ohio,  put  forward  the  name  of  Salmon 
P.  Chase,  of  Ohio. 

Mr.  Smith  of  Maryland — I  am  instructed  by  the 
State  of  Indiana  to  second  the  nomination  of  Abra- 
ham Lincoln.  [Another  outburst  of  enthusiastic  ap- 
plause from  the  body  of  the  Hall,  mingled  with  some 
hisses.] 

Francis  P.  Blair  of  Missouri  nominated  Edward 
Bates  of  Missouri. 

Mr.  Blair  of  Michigan  said,  on  the  part  of  Michigan, 
I  desire  to  say  that  the  Republicans  of  that  State 
second  the  nomination  of  William  H.  Seward  for  the 
Presidency. 

Tremendous  applause  followed  this  speech,  thou- 
sands of  those  present  rising  and  waving  their  hats  and 
handkerchiefs,  and  swelling  the  applause  to  a  thunder- 
ing roar  through  several  minutes. 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN.  127 

Tom  Corwin  of  Ohio  nominated  John  McLean  of 
Ohio  for  the  Presidency.  [Loud  applause.] 

Carl  Schurz  of  Wisconsin.,  on  the  part  of  his  State, 
here  rose  and  seconded  the  nomination  of  William  H. 
Seward. 

Upon  this  another  scene  of  the  greatest  enthusiasm 
and  tumultuous  excitement  ensued. 

Mr.  North  of  Minnesota  also  seconded,  on  the  part 
of  Minnesota,  the  nomination  of  Mr.  Seward.  [Tre- 
mendous applause.] 

Mr.  Wilson  of  Kansas— The  delegates  and  people  of 
Kansas  second  the  nomination.  [Renewed  cheers.] 

Mr.  Delano  of  Ohio,  on  the  part  of  a  large  number 
of  people  of  Ohio — I  desire  to  second  the  nomination 
of  the  man  who  can  split  rails  and  maul  Democrats, 
Abraham  Lincoln.  [Rounds  of  applause  by  Lincoln 
men.] 

A  delegate  from  Iowa  also  seconded  the  nomination 
of  Mr.  Lincoln,  on  the  part  of  that  State,  amidst  re- 
newed applause  and  excitement. 

A  Voice — Abe  Lincoln  has  it  by  the  sound  now. 
Let  us  ballot. 

Judge  Logan  of  Illinois — Mr.  President,  in  order  or 
cut  of  order,  I  propose  this  Convention  and  audience 
give  three  cheers  for  the  man  who  is  evidently  their 
nominee. 

The  President — If  the  Convention  will  get  over  this 
irrepressible  excitement,  the  roll  will  be  called. 

After  some  further  excitement  the  calling  of  the 
roll  commenced,  the  applause  at  the  different  announce- 
ments being  with  difficulty  checked. 

When  Maryland  was  called,  the  Chairman  of  the 


128  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES    OF 

delegation  cast  the  vote  of  the  State  for  Bates,  two 
delegates  claiming  their  right  to  individual  votes. 

After  some  discussion  the  Convention  rejected  the 
votes  as  cast  by  the  Chairman,  and  received  the  votes 
of  the  delegates  separately. 

On  the  first  ballot  Mr.  Seward  received  173^  votes  ; 
Mr.  Lincoln,  102  ;  and  Mr.  Bates,  48.  The  balance 
were  divided  between  Messrs.  Cameron,  Chase,  McLean, 
Wade,  etc.,  etc.  The  States  voting  for  Mr.  Lincoln, 
were  Illinois,  Indiana,  and,  in  part,  Maine,  New- 
Hampshire,  Massachusetts,  Connecticut,  Pennsylvania, 
Virginia,  Kentucky,  Ohio,  and  Iowa. 

The  second  ballot  was  then  taken. 

Mr.  Cameron's  name  was  withdrawn. 

For  Mr.  Lincoln. 

New-Hampshire 9  Delaware 6 

Vermont 10  Kentucky 9 

Rhode  Island 3  Ohio 14 

Pennsylvania 48  Iowa 5 

The  whole  vote  for  Lincoln  was  181. 

For  Mr.  Seward. 

Massachusetts 22        Kentucky 7 

New-Jersey 4        Texas 6 

Pennsylvania 2J         Nebraska 3 

The  whole  vote  for  Mr.  Seward  was  184^-. 

Bates 35        Cameron 2 

McLean 8        Dayton 10 

Chase 42J        C.  M.  Clay 2 

The  third  ballot  was  taken  amid  excitement,  and 
cries  for  "  the  ballot."  Intense  feeling  existed  during 
the  ballot,  each  vote  being  awarded  in  breathless  si- 
lence and  expectancy. 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  129 

For  Mr.  Lincoln. 

Massachusetts 8        Maryland 9 

Rhode  Island 5        Kentucky 13 

New- Jersey 8         Ohio  (applause)    29 

Pennsylvania 52         Oregon 14 

This  gave  Lincoln  230^-  votes,  or  within  1£  of  a 
nomination. 

Mr.  Andrew  of  Massachusetts  then  rose  and  correct- 
ed the  vote  of  Massachusetts,  by  changing  four  votes, 
and  giving  them  to  Lincoln,  thus  nominating  him  by 
24-  majority. 

The  Convention  immediately  became  wildly  excited. 

A  large  ^portion  of  the  delegates,  who  had  kept  tally, 
at  once  said  the  struggle  was  decided,  and  half  the 
Convention  rose,  cheering,  shouting,  and  waving  hats. 

The  audience  took  up  the  cheers,  and  the  confusion 
became  deafening. 

State  after  State  rose,  striving  to  change  their  votes 
to  the  winning  candidate,  but  the  noise  and  enthusi- 
asm rendered  it  impossible  for  the  delegates  to  make 
themselves  heard. 

Mr.  McCrillis  of  Maine,  making  himself  heard,  said 
that  the  young  giant  of  the  West  is  now  of  age. 
Maine  now  casts  for  him  her  16  votes. 

Mr.  Andrew  of  Massachusetts  changed  the  vote  of 
that  State,  giving  18  to  Mr.  Lincoln  and  8  to  Mr. 
Seward. 

Intelligence  of  the  nomination  was  now  conveyed 
to  the  men  on  the  roof  of  the  building,  who  imme- 
diately made  the  outside  multitude  aware  of  the  result. 
The  first  roar  of  the  cannon  soon  mingled  itself  with 
the  cheers  of  the  people,  and  the  same  moment  a  man 
6* 


130  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

appeared  in  the  hall  bringing  a  large  painting  of  Mr. 
Lincoln.  The  scene  at  the  time  beggars  description  ; 
11,000  people  inside,  and  20,000  or  25,000  outside, 
were  yelling  and  shouting  at  once.  Two  cannon  sent 
forth  roar  after  roar  in  quick  succession.  Delegates 
bore  up  the  sticks  and  boards  bearing  the  names  of  the 
several  States,  and  waved  them  aloft  over  their  heads, 
and  the  vast  multitude  before  the  platform  were  waving 
hats  and  handkerchiefs.  The  whole  scene  was  one  of 
the  wildest  enthusiasm. 

Mr.  Brown,  of  Mo.,  desired  to  change  18  votes  of 
Missouri  for  the  gallant  son  of  the  West,  Abraham 
Lincoln  ;'  Iowa,  Connecticut,  Kentucky,  and  Minne- 
sota, also  changed  their  votes.  The  result  of  the  third 
ballot  was  announced  : 

Whole  number  of  votes  cast , 466 

Necessary  to  a  choice 234 

Mr.  Abraham  Lincoln  received  354,  and  was  declared 
duly  nominated. 

The  States  still  voting  for  Seward  were  Massachu- 
setts, 8  ;  New- York,  70  ;  New- Jersey,  5  ;  Pennsylva- 
nia, *  ;  Maryland,  2  ;  Michigan,  12  ;  Wisconsin,  10  ; 
California,  3 — total,  110L 

Mr.  Dayton  received  one  vote  from  New-Jersey,  and 
Mr.  McLean  half  a  vote  from  Pennsylvania. 

The  result  was  received  with  renewed  applause. 

When  silence  was  restored,  Win.  M.  Evarts  came 
forward  on  the  Secretary's  table,  and  spoke  as  follows : 

"  Mr.  Chairman,  Gentlemen  of  the  National  Con- 
vention : — The  State  of  New- York,  by  a  full  delega- 
tion, with  complete  unanimity  in  purpose  at  home, 
came  to  the  Convention  and  presented  its  choice,  one 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  131 

of  its  citizens,  who  had  served  the  State  from  boyhood 
up,  and  labored  for  and  loved  it.  We  came  here,  a 
great  State,  with,  as  we  thought,  a  great  statesman 
(applause),  and  our  love  of  the  great  Kepublic,  from 
which  we  are  all  delegates.  The  great  Kepublic  of  the 
American  Union,  and  our  love  for  the  great  Republi- 
can party  of  the  Union,  and  our  love  for  our  states- 
man and  candidate,  made  us  think  we  did  our  duty  to 
the  country,  and  the  whole  country,  in  expressing  our 
preference  and  love  for  him.  (Applause.)  But,  gen- 
tlemen, it  was  from  Governor  Seward  that  most  of  us 
learned  to  love  Eepublican  principles  and  the  Republi- 
can party.  (Cheers.)  His  fidelity  to  the  country,  the 
Constitution,  and  the  laws — his  fidelity  to  the  party 
and  the  principle  that  majorities  govern — his  interest 
in  the  advancement  of  our  party  to  its  victory,  that 
our  country  may  rise  to  its  true  glory,  induces  me  to 
declare  that  I  speak  his  sentiments,  as  I  do  the  united 
opinion  of  our  delegation,  when  I  move,  sir,  as  I  do 
now,  that  the  nomination  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  of  Il- 
linois, as  the  Republican  candidate  for  the  suffrages  of 
the  whole  country  for  the  office  of  Chief  Magistrate 
of  the  Americans  Union,  be  made  unanimous."  (Ap- 
plause, and  three  cheers  for  New- York.) 

T-he  life-size  portrait  of  Abraham  Lincoln  was  here 
exhibited  from  the  platform,  amid  renewed  cheers. 

Mr.  Andrews,  of  Massachusetts,  on  the  part  of  the 
united  delegation  of  that  State,  seconded  the  motion 

O  ™ 

of  the  gentleman  of  New- York,  that  the  nomination 
be  made  unanimous. 

Eloquent  speeches,  endorsing  the  nominee,  were  also 
made  by  Carl  Schurz,  F.  P.  Blair,  of  Missouri,  and 


132  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

Mr.  Browning,  of  Illinois,  all  of  which  breathed  a 
spirit  of  confidence  and  enthusiasm. 

At  the  close,  three  hearty  cheers  were  given  for 
New-York,  and  the  nomination  of  Mr.  Lincoln  made 
unanimous. 

With  loud  cheers  for  Lincoln,  the  Convention  ad- 
journed till  five  o'clock. 

On  the  first  ballot,  in  the  evening  session,  Mr.  Ham- 
lin,  of  Maine,  received  194  votes  for  the  Vice-Presi- 
dency, and  was  nominated  with  enthusiasm. 

THE    RATIFICATION    BY    THE    PEOPLE. 

Everywhere,  throughout  the  land,  in  New-York  as 
well  as  Illinois,  in  Pennsylvania  as  well  as  Indiana, 
everywhere,  the  voice  of  the  people  has  gone  .up  in 
shouts  of  joy  over  the  nomination  of  Lincoln  and 
Hamlin.  Even  from  Albany,  where  the  friends  of  Mr. 
Seward  were  so  strong,  comes  a  despatch  like  the  fol- 
lowing, dated  the  night  of  the  day  on  which  the  nom- 
inations were  made  : 

"Nine  o'clock, p.  m. — The  Eepublicans  of  this  city 
are  now  fairly  waked  up,  and  the  wildest  excitement 
prevails  in  regard  to  the  nomination  of  Lincoln.  State 
street  is  a  perfect  sea  of  fire  from  burning  tar  barrels. 
The  whole  heavens  are  illuminated  with  a  red  glare, 
cannon  is  firing,  music  is  playing,  and  the  people  are 
shouting  on  State  street  and  Broadway.  Both  streets 
are  literally  jammed  with  men  of  all  parties,  who  are 
earnestly  discussing  the  action  of  the  Convention. 

"  The  Republicans  of  the  city  are  now  more  reconciled 
to  the  nomination,  and  unite  in  hearty  approval  of  it. 
They  consider  that  while  Lincoln  may  not  be  as  strong 
in  the  State  as  Seward,  he  will  be  less  objectionable 
throughout  the  Union. 


ABKAHAM     LINCOLN.  133 

"  Since  the  reception  of  the  successful  laying  of  the 
Atlantic  cable,  no  more  animated  scene  has  ever  been 
witnessed  in  this  city  than  has  been  seen  this  evening. 

"  In  New- York  two  six-pounders  were  brought  to  the 
Park,  and  fired  each  a  hundred  times — one  of  them  by 
order  of  the  Kepublican  General  Committee,  and  the 
other  under  the  patronage  of  private  citizens.  Besides 
these  the  Central  Committee  ordered  one  hundred  guns 
to  be  fired  in  Madison  and  Hamilton  squares  respective- 
ly. In  Mount  Morris  square,  also,  the  big  gun  was 
brought  out,  and  a  hundred  rounds  announced  to  the 
citizens  the  nomination  of  Lincoln  and  Hamlin.  Great 
numbers  of  enthusiastic  Kepublicans  gathered  in  the 
square,  and  the  excitement  was  intense." 

In  Philadelphia  :  "  The  Republicans  opened  their 
campaign  by  an  immense  mass  meeting  in  Independence 
Square.  JOHN  B.  MYERS,  Esq.  presided  at  the  main 
stand,  and  three  other  meetings  were  organized — two 
at  opposite  angles  of  the  square  and  one  within  the 
State-House.  The  meeting  having  been  called  to  rati- 
fy the  nominations  made  by  the  Chicago  Convention, 
this  was  done  in  a  series  of  resolutions  highly  eulogistic 
of  the  candidates  and  approving  and  adopting  the  plat- 
form on  which  they  have  been  placed.  Speeches  were 
delivered  by  Mr.  Senator  TRUMBULL,  of  Illinois  ; 
CHAKLES  K.  TRAIN,  of  Massachusetts  ;  Wm.  M. 
DUNN,  of  Indiana  ;  ORRIS  S.  FERRY,  of  Connecticut ; 
JAMES  H.  CAMPBELL,  of  Pennsylvania  ;  JOHN  SHER- 
MAN, of  Ohio  ;  G.  A.  GROW,  of  Pennsylvania  ;  JUSTIN 
S.  MORRIL,  of  Vermont ;  M.  S.  WILKINSON,  of  Min- 
nesota ;  and  other  distinguished  gentlemen.  The  as- 
semblage, in  the  display  of  numbers  and  enthusiasm, 
has  rarely  if  ever  been  surpassed.  Ward  processions 
marched  to  the  square  with  bands  of  music,  fireworks, 


134  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES    OF 

transparencies,  rails,  etc,  ;  and  when  the  series  of  meet- 
ings concluded,  at  about  half-past  ten  o'clock,  the 
multitude  then  proceeded  to  the  Continental  hotel  in 
compliment  to  the  distinguished  speakers. 

In  a  speech  at  a  Republican  ratification  meeting  at 
Harrisburg,  Senator  Cameron,  while  declaring  that  he 
had  hoped  for  the  nomination  of  Mr.  Seward,  described 
Mr.  Lincoln  as  "  a  candidate  less  known  in  public  life, 
perhaps,  but  who,  on  all  occasions,  when  demands  have 
been  made  upon  his  zeal  and  patriotism,  has  borne  him- 
self bravely  and  honorably.  In  regard  to  the  great 
interests  of  Pennsylvania,  the  subject  of  protection  to 
labor,  his  record  is  clear,  emphatic,  and  beyond  suspi- 
cion. He  will  require  no  endorsement  to  convince  the 
people  of  Pennsylvania  that  their  interests  will  be  per- 
fectly secure  in  his  hands.  Himself  a  laborer  in  early 
life,  he  has  struggled  with  adversity  until  he  has  reach- 
ed the  proud  position  he  now  occupies,  by  the  single 
aid  of  a  strong  purpose,  seconded  by  an  unyielding 
will ;  and  it  is  not  in  the  hearts  of  Pennsylvanians  to 
doubt  such  a  man.  The  laboring  men  of  this  State 
ever  control  the  ballot-box  when  they  arise  in  the  maj- 
esty of  their  strength.  Let  them  go  to  the  election 
next  autumn,  and,  while  they  are  securing  their  own 
interests,  let  them  elevate  to  the  highest  place  in  their 
election  gift,  Abraham  Lincoln,  a  workingman  like 
themselves." 

At  Washington,  D.  C.,  an  enthusiastic  ratification 
meeting  was  held — the  first  time  such  a  meeting  has 
been  held  in  that  city. 

The  public  press  was  never  before  so  unanimous  in 
its  commendation  of  a  candidate. 


ABEAHAM    LINCOLN.  135 

The  N.  Y.  Tribune  says  : 

"  While  Mr.  Lincoln's  position  as  a  Republican  ren- 
ders him  satisfactory  to  the  most  zealous  member  of 
the  party,  the  moderation  of  his  character,  and  the 
conservative  tendencies  of  his  mind,  long  improved  and 
well  known  of  all  men  in  public  life,  commend  him  to 
every  section  of  the  opposition.  There  is  no  good 
reason  why  Americans  and  Whigs,  and  in  short  all 
who  are  inspired  rather  by  patriotism  than  by  party 
feeling,  should  not  rally  to  his  support.  Republicans 
and  conservatives,  those  who  dread  the  extension  of 
Slavery,  and  those  who  dread  the  progress  of  adminis- 
trative and  legislative  corruption,  may  be  assured  that 
in  him  both  these  evils  will  find  a  stern  and  immovable 
antagonist  and  an  impassable  barrier.  At  the  same 
time,  as  a  man  of  the  people,  raised  by  his  own  genius 
and  integrity  from  the  humblest  to  the  highest  position, 
having  made  for  himself  an  honored  name  as  a  lawyer, 
an  advocate,  a  popular  orator,  a  statesman,  and  a  man, 
the  industrious  and  intelligent  masses  of  the  country 
may  well  hail  his  nomination  with  a  swelling  tide  of 
enthusiasm,  of  which  the  wild  and  prolonged  outbursts 
at  Chicago  yesterday  are  the  fitting  prelude  and  be- 
ginning. 

We  need  hardly  say  that  the  election  of  Mr.  Lincoln, 
though  it  cannot  be  accomplished  without  arduous  and 
persistent  efforts,  is  eminently  a  thing  that  can  be  done. 
The  disruption  of  the  Democratic  Party,  now  perhaps 
less  likely  to  be  repaired  than  before  his  nomination, 
the  fact  that  he  was  put  forward  by  one  of  the  doubt- 
ful States,  Illinois,  and  nominated  in  great  measure  by 
votes  from  two  others,  namely  Pennsylvania  and  New- 
Jersey,  the  universal  desire  of  the  country  to  settle  the 
vexatious  Slavery  question  in  accordance  with  the 
views  of  the  fathers — all  these  are  powerful  in  behalf 
of  the  Chicago  ticket." 

The  Springfield,  Mass.,  Republican  : 


136  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

"  In  ways,  which  it  is  useless  to  mention  now,  we 
are,  of  course,  disappointed  ;  in  ways,  which  .we  shall 
have  frequent  occasion  to  mention  between  this  date 
and  November,  we  are  glad  and  grateful.  The  nomi- 
nee is  a  positive  man — a  live  man — and  in  these  re- 
spects matches  well  with  the  platform,  which  is  bold, 
manly,  and  comprehensive.  The  many  friends  of  Mr. 
Seward,  particularly,  will  feel  aggrieved  by  this  result, 
but  it  could  not  have  been  otherwise.  The  States 
which  must  be  carried  to  secure  a  Kepublican  triumph 
did  not  dare  to  assume  Mr.  Seward,  and  the  forcing  up- 
on them  of  a  name  that  would  weaken  them,  and  de- 
velop opposition — organized  and  consolidated — would 
have  been  neither  wise  nor  fair.  We  predict  for  the 
ticket  a  popularity  that  will  grow,  as  the  campaign  ad- 
vances, into  a  furor  of  enthusiasm.  We  predict,  fur- 
thermore, that  it  will  be  elected." 

The  Boston  Atlas  : 

"  As  in  1840  and  1848,  the  Whig  party  passed  by 
the  prominent  names  before  the  Conventions  at  the  out- 
set, and  as  in  1844  and  in  1852  the  Democratic  party 
did  the  same  thing,  and  elected  men  who  were  not  the 
most  prominently  before  the  people,  the  Republicans 
have  in  this  instance  taken  up  men  fresh  from  the  peo- 
ple, of  broad  and  statesmanlike  qualities,  of  unques- 
tioned abilities,  and  of  tried  patriotism,  in  what  is  to 
be  to  them  a  great,  and,  as  we  confidently  believe,  a 
triumphantly  successful  campaign.  In  a  nomination 
of  this  nature,  there  must  have  been  necessarily  many 
preferences  from  people  of  different  sections,  some  of 
which  were  to  be  set  aside.  Mr.  Seward,  Mr.  Chase, 
Mr.  Cameron,  Mr.  Banks,  Mr.  Bates,  and  Mr.  McLean,  all 
have  friends  presented  their  names  for  the  first  or  sec- 
ond place  on  the  ticket.  For  ourselves,  we  might  have 
had  personal  preferences  equally  strong  with  others. 
But  at  a  time  like  this,  personal  preferences  are  to  be 
subordinated  to  the  will  of  the  majority,  as  expressed 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  137 

in  the  Convention,  as  to  the  success  of  the  ticket  as  in- 
dicated by  the  judgment  of  that  body." 

The  N.  Y.  Evening  Post  : 

"  Our  country  is  not,  however,  distinguished  alone  for 
its  stupendous  physical  progress,  for  those  grand  tri- 
umphs over  nature  which  have  sprinkled  the  whole  con- 
tinent with  cities,  and  connected  its  remotest  parts  by 
railroads  and  telegraphs.  It  has  also  worked  out  for  it- 
self a  peculiar  social  and  political  constitution.  Pla- 
cing, for  the  first  time  in  the  history  of  mankind,  the 
controlling  power  of  government  in  the  hands  of  the 
whole  people,  it  has  constructed  a  vast  fabric  of  socie- 
ty on  that  new  basis.  It  has  said  to  all  ranks  and  or- 
ders of  men,  here  you  are  free  ;  here  you  are  equal  in 
rights  to  each  other  ;  here  the  careers  of  life  are  open 
to  every  comer  ;  men  are  thrown  upon  their  own 
intrinsic  manhood  for  their  reliance,  and  it  belongs  to 
each  one  to  become  the  architect  of  his  own  fortunes. 
This  unlimited  freedom  of  action,  though  it  has  pro- 
duced some  social  evils,  has  produced  much  greater 
good,  and  we  do  not  believe  that  there  is  a  nation  on 
the  globe  in  which  the  masses  of  the  people  are  so 
prosperous,  so  intelligent,  and  so  contented  as  they  are 
in  this  nation.  What  more  striking  illustration  of  its 
effects  could  we  have,  than  the  rise  of  Mr.  ^Lincoln  to 
his  present  importance  in  the  eyes  of  the  world  ?  Is 
he  not  pre-eminently  the  child  of  our  free  institutions  ? 
A  poor  orphan,  without  education  or  friends,  by  the 
labor  of  his  hands,  by  the  energy  of  his  will,  by  the 
manliness  and  probity  of  his  character,  he  raises  him- 
self to  fortune  and  fame  ;  a  powerful  party,  which 
contains,  to  say  the  least,  as  much  virtue  and  intelli- 
gence as  any  other,  assigns  him,  without  intrigues  or 
efforts  of  his  own,  the  first  place  in  its  regards,  making 
him  the  bearer  of  its  standard  in  a  momentous  politi- 
cal conflict  ;  and  in  a  few  months  more  we  may  see  the 
once  friendless  boy  the  occupant  of  the  Presidential 


138  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

chair.  Thus  the  spirit  of  our  institutions  is  strikingly 
embodied  in  his  career,  which  is  itself  an  admirable 
commentary  on  their  excellence." 

And  the  conservative  Philadelphia  North  Ameri- 
can : 

"  The  people  of  Pennsylvania  are  eminently  practi- 
cal in  all  their  views  and  actions.  We  are  not  hasty 
nor  inconsiderate.  We  take  time  to  reflect  and  gener- 
ally act  intelligently.  It  has  been  so  in  this  case. 
Our  State  entered  into  the  canvass  at  Chicago  with 
a  spirit,  a  determination,  and  an  indomitable  energy 
which  completely  surprised  the  gentlemen  from  the  ex- 
treme North,  and  served  us  a  rallying  point  for  all  the 
moderates.  The  Pennsylvania  delegation  was  gener- 
ally accredited  with  the  selfish  purpose  of  going  to  Chi- 
cago to  secure  the  nomination  of  one  of  our  own  sons. 
Such  was  far  from  the  truth.  When  the  ground  was 
surveyed,  it  was  found  that  from  the  Atlantic  seacoast 
of  Jersey  to  the  Mississippi  river,  in  the  whole  belt  of 
States  south  of  New- York  and  Michigan,  there  was  a 
settled  determination  not  to  take  Mr.  Seward,  nor,  in- 
deed, any  extreme  man.  Yet  'ths  councils  of  these 
States  were  divided,  and  no  chance  of  concentration 
seemed  to  present  itself.  At  length  Pennsylvania,  by 
the  force  of  her  numbers  and  courage,  solved  the  prob- 
lem. She  sacrificed  her  own  canditate,  and  rushed 
over  to  the  side  of  the  Illinois  favorite,  Lincoln. 

"  This  nomination  was  made  by  Pennsylvania,  and  it 
could  not  have  been  accomplished  without  her.  She 
brought  together,  for  the  first  time,  this  noble  phalanx 
of  central  free  States,  and  gave  them  a  community  of 
feeling  and  purpose.  From  the  first  moment  that  this 
movement  was  begun  victory  was  no  longer  doubtful. 
Pennsylvania  demanded  a  protectionist,  and  so  did  all 
the  States  of  this  combination.  Her  demand  could 
not  be  refused,  and  in  Mr.  Lincoln  we  have  one  whose 
devotion  to  American  interests  has  been  lifelong. 


ABEAHAM     LINCOLN.  139 

Sprung,  too,  from  good  old  Pennsylvania  stock,  he 
was  peculiarly  entitled  to  her  support. 

"  Under  these  circumstances  it  is  clear  that  our  gal- 
lant State  has  gained  a  signal  triumph  at  Chicago,  and 
one,  too,  the  effects  of  which  are  likely  to  prove  lasting. 
In  the  demonstration  of  joy  with  which  the  nomination 
has  been  hailed  at  Easton,  Westchester,  and  other 
points  throughout  the  interior,  we  read  the  indications 
of  the  popular  feeling.  The  belief  is  general  that  this 
is  a  Pennsylvania  ticket,  and  must  receive  the  vote  of 
the  State.  In  fact,  the  people  of  this  commonwealth 
are  determined  not  to  permit  the  election  of  another 
Democratic  President,  no  matter  with  how  much 
clamor  any  particular  section  of  the  country  may  de- 
mand it.  The  interests  of  the  whole  country  must  be 
attended  to  first,  and  those  of  sections  afterward.  We 
must  purge  the  government  of  the  corruptions  which 
befoul  every  department  at  Washington.  We  must 
substitute  honest,  and  patriotic,  and  sensible  men  for 
reckless,  and  intriguing,  and  plunder-seeking  faction- 
ists,  to  whom  the  interests  of  humanity,  the  progress 
of  civilization  and  enlightenment,  and  the  rights  and 
privileges  of  citizenship,  are  too  small  for  serious  con- 
sideration." 

And  so  we  might  go  on,  quoting  hundreds  of  pages 
of  similar  remarks  from  the  American  Press. 

MR.    LINCOLN   AT   HOME. 

The  Committee  appointedby  the  National  Convention 
to  wait  upon  Mr.  Lincoln,  and  inform  him  of  his  nomi- 
nation, immediately  performed  their  duty.  A  corre- 
spondent of  the  Chicago  Journal  gives  the  subjoined 
graphic  account  of  the  visit  of  the  Committee  : 

"  The  excursion  train  bearing  the  Committee  appoint- 
ed by  the  National  Convention  at  Chicago  to  wait  on 


140  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

Mr.  Lincoln  and  notify  him  of  his  nomination,  consist- 
ing of  the  President  of  the  Convention,  the  Hon.  G-eo. 
Ashmun  of  Mass.,  and  the  chairmen  of  the  different 
State  delegations,  arrived  at  Springfield,  Friday  even- 
ing at  seven  o'clock. 

"A  great  crowd  was  awaiting  them  at  the  depot,  and 
greeted  their  coming  with  enthusiastic  shouts.  From 
the  depot  they  marched  to  the  hotel,  accompanied  by 
the  crowd,  and  two  or  three  bands  discoursing  stirring 
music.  The  appearance  and  names  of  the  more  distin- 
guished delegates  were  received  with  vociferous  ap- 
plause, especially  the  venerable  and  famous  Francis  P. 
Blair  of  Maryland,  the  Hon.  E.  D.  Morgan,  Governor 
of  New-York,  and  Governor  Boutwell  of  Massachu- 
setts. 

"  When  they  arrived  at  the  hotel  the  crowd,  still 
increasing,  deployed  off  to  the  State-House  square,  to 
-give  vent  to  their  enthusiasm  in  almost  continual 
cheers,  and  listen  to  fervent  speeches. 

"  Having  partaken  of  a  bountiful  supper,  the  delegates 
proceeded  quietly,  by  such  streets  as  would  escape  the 
crowd,  to  the  residence  of  Mr.  Lincoln.  Quite  a  num- 
ber of  outsiders  were  along,  among  whom  were  half  a 
dozen  editors,  including  the  Hon.  Henry  J.  Raymond  of 
The  New-  York  Times. 

"Among  the  delegates  composing  the  Committee,  were 
many  of  the  most  distinguished  men  in  that  great  Con- 
vention, such  as  Mr.  Evarts  of  New- York,  the  accom- 
plished and  eloquent  spokesman  of  the  delegation  from 
the  Empire  State,  and  friend  of  Mr.  Seward  ;  Judge 
Kelly  of  Pennsylvania,  whose  tall  form  and  sonorous 
eloquence  excited  so  much  attention  ;  Mr.  Andrew  of 
Massachusetts,  the  round-faced,  handsome  man,  who 
made  such  a  beautiful  and  telling  speech  on  behalf  of 
the  old  Bay  State,  in  seconding  the  motion  to  make 
Lincoln's  nomination  unanimous  ;  Mr.  Simmons,  the 
gray-headed  United  States  Senator  from  Rhode  Island; 
Mr.  Ashmun,  the  President  of  the  Convention,  so  long 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  141 

the  bosom  friend  and  ardent  admirer  of  Daniel  Web- 
ster, and  the  leader  of  the  Massachusetts  Whigs  ;  the 
veteran  Blair,  and  his  gallant  sons,  Frank  P.  and 
Montgomery  ;  brave  old  Blakie  of  Kentucky  ;  Galla- 
gher, the  literary  man  of  Ohio  ;  burly,  loud-voiced 
Cartter  of  Ohio,  who  announced  the  four  votes  that 
gave  Lincoln  the  nomination,  and  others  that  I  have 
not  time  to  mention. 

"  In  a  few  minutes  (it  now  being  about  8  p.  M.),  they 
were  at  Lincoln's  house — an  elegant  two-story  dwell- 
ing, fronting  west,  of  pleasing  exterior,  with  a  neat 
and  roomy  appearance,  situated  in  the  quiet  part  of  the 
town,  surrounded  with  shrubbery.  As  they  were  pass- 
ing in  at  the  gate  and  up  the  steps,  two  handsome  lads 
of  eight  or  ten  years  me.  t  them  with  a  courteous  '  Good 
evening,  gentlemen.' 

"  'Are  you  Mr.  Lincoln's  son  ? '  said  Mr.  Evarts  of 
New-York.  '  Yes,  sir/  said  the  boy.  '  Then  let's 
shake  hands  ;'  and  they  began  greeting  him  so  warmly 
as  to  excite  the  younger  one's  attention,  who  had  stood 
silently  by  the  opposite  gatepost,  and  he  sang  out, 
'  I'm  a  Lincoln,  too  ;'  whereupon  several  delegates, 
amid  much  laughter,  saluted  the  young  Lincoln. 

Having  all  collected  in  the  large  north  parlor,  Mr. 
Ashmun  addressed  Mr.  Lincoln,  who  stood  at  the  east 
end  of  the  room,  as  follows  : 

"  '  I  have,  sir,  the  honor,  in  behalf  of  the  gentlemen 
who  are  present,  a  Committee  appointed  by  the  Repub- 
lican Convention,  recently  assembled  at  Chicago,  to 
discharge  a  most  pleasant  duty.  We  have  come,  sir, 
under  a  vote  of  instructions  to  that  Committee,  to 
notify  you  that  you  have  been  selected  by  the  Conven- 
tion of  the  Republicans  at  Chicago,  for  President  of  the 
United  States.  They  instruct  us,  sir,  to  notify  you  of 
that  selection,  and  that  Committee  deem  it  not  only 
respectful  to  yourself,  but  appropriate  to  the  important 
matter  which  they  have  in  hand,  that  they  should 
come  in  person,  and  present  to  you  the  authentic  evi- 


142  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES     OF 

dence  of  the  action  of  that  Convention ;  and,  sir,  with- 
out any  phrase  which  shall  either  be  considered  person- 
ally plauditory  to  yourself,  or  which  shall  have  any 
reference  to  the  principles  involved  in  the  questions 
which  are  connected  with  your  nomination,  I  desire  to 
present  to  you  the  letter  which  has  been  prepared,  and 
which  informs  you  of  the  nomination,  and  with  it  the 
platform,  resolutions,  and  sentiments,  which  the  Con- 
vention adopted.  Sir,  at  your  convenience,  we  shall 
be  glad  to  receive  from  you  such  a  response  as  it  may 
be  your  pleasure  to  give  us.' 

u  Mr.  Lincoln  listened  with  a  countenance  grave  and 
earnest,  almost  to  sternness,  regarding  Mr.  Ashmun 
with  the  profoundest  attention,  and  at  the  conclusion  of 
that  gentleman's  remarks,  after  an  impressive  pause, 
he  replied  in  a  clear  but  subdued  voice,  with  that  per- 
fect enunciation,  which  always  marks  his  utterance, 
and  a  dignified  sincerity  of  manner  suited  to  the  man 
and  the  occasion,  in  the  following  words  : 

"'MR.  CHAIRMAN,  AND  GENTLEMEN  OF  THE  COM- 
MITTEE :  I  tender  to  you,  and  through  you  to  the  Ke- 
publican  National  Convention,  and  all  the  people 
represented  in  it,  my  profoundest  thanks  for  the  high 
honor  done  me,  which  you  now  formally  announce. 
Deeply,  and  even  painfully  sensible  of  the  great  respon- 
sibility which  is  inseparable  from  this  high  honor — a 
responsibility  which  I  could  almost  wish  had  fallen 
upon  some  one  of  the  far  more  eminent  men  and  ex- 
perienced statesmen  whose  distinguished  names  wer<" 
before  the  Convention,  I  shall,  by  your  leave,  conside 
more  fully  the  resolutions  of  the  Convention,  denomi- 
nated the  platform,  and  without  unnecessary  or  un- 
reasonable delay,  respond  to  you,  Mr.  Chairman,  in 
writing,  not  doubting  that  the  platform  will  be  found 
satisfactory,  and  the  nomination  gratefully  accepted. 

"  :  And  now  I  will  not  longer  defer  the  pleasure  of 
taking  you,  and  each  of  you,  by  the  hand.' 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  143 

"  Mr.  Ashmun  then  introduced  the  delegates  person- 
ally to  Mr.  Lincoln,  who  shook  them  heartily  by  the 
h-md.  Gov.  Morgan,  Mr.  Blair,  Senator  Simmons,  Mr. 
Welles,  and  Mr.  Fogg,  of  Connecticut,  were  first  in- 
troduced ;  then  came  hearty  old  Mr.  Blakie,  of  Ken- 
tucky, Lincoln's  native  State,  and,  of  course,  they  had 
to  compare  notes,  inquire  up  old  neighbors,  and,  if  the 
time  had  allowed,  they  would  soon  have  started  to 
tracing  out  the  old  pioneer  families.  Major  Ben. 
Eggleston,  of  Cincinnati,  was  next,  and  his  greeting 
and  reception  were  equally  hearty.  Tall  Judge  Kelly, 
of  Pennsylvania,  was  then  presented  by  Mr.  Ashmun 
to  Mr.  Lincoln.  As  they  shook  hands,  each  eyed  the 
other's  ample  proportions,  with  genuine  admiration — 
Lincoln,  for  once,  standing  erect  as  an  Indian  during 
this  evening,  and  showing  his  tall  form  in  its  full 
dignity. 

"  '  What's  your  height  ?'  inquired  Lincoln. 

" '  Six  feet  three  ;  what  is  yours,  Mr.  Lincoln  !' 
said  Judge  Kelly,  in  his  round,  deliberate  tone. 

"  '  Six  feet  four,'  replied  Lincoln. 
"  '  Then,'  said  Judge  Kelly,  '  Pennsylvania  bows 
to  Illinois.  My  dear  man,  for  years  my  heart  has  been 
aching  for  a  President  that  I  could  look  up  to,  and  I've 
found  him  at  last  in  the  land  where  we  thought  there 
were  none  but  little  giants/ 

"  Mr.  Evarts,  of  New- York,  expressed  very  gracefully 
his  gratification  at  meeting  Mr.  Lincoln,  whom  he  had 
heard  at  Cooper  Institute,  but  where,  on  account  of 
the  pressure  and  crowd,  he  had  to  go  away  without  an 
introduction. 

"  Mr.  Andrews,  of  Massachusetts,  said,  '  We  claim 
you,  Mr.  Lincoln,  as  coming  from  Massachusetts,  be- 
cause all  the  old  Lincoln  name  are  from  Plymouth  Col- 
ony.' 

"  '  We'll  consider  it  so  this  evening,'  said  Lincoln. 

"  Various  others  were  presented,  when  Mr.  Ashmun 
asked  them  to  come  up  and  introduce  themselves. 


144  LIFE    AND     SPEECHES     OF 

1  Come  up,  gentlemen/  said  Mr.  Judd, '  it's  nobody  but 
Old  Abe  Lincoln/  The  greatest  good  feeling  pre- 
vailed. As  the  delegates  fell  back,  each  congratulated 
the  other  that  they  had  got  just  the  sort  of  man.  A 
neatly-dressed  New-Englander  remarked  to  us,  '  I  was 
afraid  I  should  meet  a  gigantic  rail-splitter,  with  the 
manners  of  a  flatboatman,  and  the  ugliest  face  in 
creation  ;  and  he's  a  complete  gentleman/  . 

"  Mrs.  Lincoln  received  the  delegates  in  the  south 
parlor,  where  they  were  severally  conducted  after  their 
official  duty  was  performed.  It  will,  no  doubt,  be  a 
gratification  to  those  who  have  not  seen  this  amiable 
and  accomplished  lady  to  know  that  she  adorns  a  draw- 
ing-room, presides  over  a  table,  does  the  honors  on  an 
occasion,  like  the  present,  or  will  do  the  honors  at  the 
White-House,  with  appropriate  grace.  She  is  a  daugh- 
ter of  Dr.  Todd,  formerly  of  Kentucky,  and  long  one 
of  the  prominent  citizens  of  Springfield.  She  is  one 
of  three  sisters  noted  for  their  beauty  and  accomplish- 
ments. One  of  them  is  now  the  wife  of  Ninian  "W". 
Edwards,  Esq.,  son  of  old  Gov.  Edwards.  Mrs.  Lin- 
coln is  now  apparently  about  35  years  of  age,  is  a  very 
handsome  woman,  with  a  vivacious  and  graceful  man- 
ner ;  is  an  interesting  and  often  sparkling  talker. 
Standing  by  her  almost  gigantic  husband,  she  appears 
petite,  but  is  really  about  the  average  height  of  ladies. 
They  have  three  sons,  two  of  them  already  mentioned, 
and  an  older  one — a  young  man  of  16  or  18  years,  now 
at  Harvard  College,  Mass. 

"  Mr.  Lincoln  bore  himself  during  the  evening  with 
dignity  and  ease.  His  kindly  and  sincere  manner,  frank 
and  honest  expression,  unaffected,  pleasant  conversa- 
tion, soon  made  every  one  feel  at  ease,  and  rendered 
the  hour  and  a  half  which  they  spent  with  him  one  of 
great  pleasure  to  the  delegates.  He  was  dressed  with 
perfect  neatness,  almost  elegance — though,  as  all  Illi- 
noians  know,  he  usually  is  as  plain  in  his  attire  as  he 
is  modest  and  unassuming  in  deportment.  He  stood 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  145 

erect,  displaying  to  excellent  advantage  his   tall  and 
manly  figure. 

"  Perhaps  some  reader  will  be  curious  to  know  how 
*  Honest  Old  Abe'  received  the  news  of  his  nomination. 
He  had  been  up  in  the  telegraph  office  during  the  first 
and  second  ballots  on  Friday  morning.  As  the  vote  of 
each  State  was  announced  on  the  platform  at  Chicago, 
it  was  telegraphed  to  Springfield,  and  those  who  were 
gathered  there  figured  up  the  vote,  and  hung  over  the 
result  with  the  same  breathless  anxiety  as  the  crowd  at 
the  Wigwam.  As  soon  as  the  second  ballot  was  taken, 
and  before  it  had  been  counted  and  announced  by  the 
secretaries,  Mr.  Lincoln  walked  over  to  the  State  Jour- 
nal office.  He  was  sitting  there  conversing  while  the 
third  ballot  was  being  taken.  When  Cartter,  of  Ohio, 
announced  the  change  of  four  votes,  giving  Lincoln  a 
majority,  and  before  the  great  tumult  of  applause  in 
the  Wigwam  had  fairly  begun,  it  was  telegraphed  to 
Springfield.  Mr.  Wilson,  telegraph  superintendent,  who 
was  in  the  office,  instantly  wrote  on  a  scrap  of  paper, 
'  Mr.  Lincoln,  you  are  nominated  on  the  third  ballot/ 
and  gave  it  to  a  boy,  who  ran  with  it  to  Mr.  Lincoln. 
He  took  the  paper  in  his  hand,  and  looked  at  it  long 
and  silently,  not  heeding  the  noisy  exultation  of  all 
around,  and  then  rising  and  putting  the  note  in  his  vest 
pocket,  he  quietly  remarked,  '  There's  a  little  woman 
down  at  our  house  would  like  to  hear  this.  I'll  go 
down  and  tell  her.' 

"  It  is  needless  to  say  that  the  people  of  Springfield 
were  delirious  with  joy  and  enthusiasm  both  that  even- 
ing and  since.  As  the  delegates  returned  to  the  hotel 
— the  sky  blazing  wi'th  rockets,  cannon  roaring  at  in- 
tervals, bonfires  blazing  at  the  street  corners,  long  rows 
of  buildings  brilliantly  illuminated,  the  State-House 
overflowing  with  shouting  people,  speakers  awakening 
new  enthusiasm — one  of  the  New-England  delegates 
remarked  that  there  were  more  enthusiasm  and  sky- 
rockets than  he  ever  saw  in  a  town  of  that  size  before. 


146  LIFE     AND      SPEECHES     OF 

"  The  Ohio  delegates  brought  back  with  them  a  rail, 
one  of  the  original  three  thousand  split  by  Lincoln  in 
1830  ;  and  though  it  bears  the  marks  of  years,  is  still 
tough  enough  for  service.  It  is  for  Tom  Corwin,  who 
intends  taking  it  with  him  as  he  stumps  the  Buckeye 
State  for  honest  old  Abe/' 

A  correspondent  of  the  New- York  Evening  Post  de- 
scribes his  visit  to  Mr.  Lincoln  in  the  following  manner  : 

"  It  had  been  reported  by  some  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  po- 
litical enemies,  that  he  was  a  man  who  lived  in  the 
'  lowest  hoosier  style/  and  I  thought  I  would  see  for 
myself.  Accordingly,  as  soon  as  the  business  of  the 
Convention  was  closed,  I  took  the  cars  for  Springfield. 
I  found  Mr.  Lincoln  living  in  a  handsome,  but  not  pre- 
tentious, double  two-story  frame  house,  having  a  wide 
hall  running  through  the  centre,  with  parlors  on  both 
sides,  neatly,  but  not  ostentatiously,  furnished.  It  was 
just  such  a  dwelling  as  a  majority  of  the  well-to-do 
residents  of  these  fine  western  towns  occupy.  Every- 
thing about  it  had  a  look  of  comfort  and  independence. 
The  library  I  remarked  in  passing,  particularly,  and  I 
was  pleased  to  see  long  rows  of  books,  which  told  of  the 
scholarly  tastes  and  culture  of  the  family. 

"Lincoln  received  us  with  great,  and  to  me,  sur- 
prising urbanity.  I  had  seen  him  before  in  New- York, 
and  brought  with  me  an  impression  of  his  awkward 
and  ungainly  manner  ;  but  in  his  own  house,  where  he 
doubtless  feels  himself  freer  than  in  the  strange  New- 
York  circles,  he  had  thrown  this  off,  and  appeared  easy, 
if  not  graceful.  He  is,  as  you  know,  a  tall,  lank  man, 
with  a  long  neck,  and  his  ordinary  movements  are 
unusually  angular,  even  out  West.  As  soon,  however, 
as  he  gets' interested  in  conversation,  his  face  lights  up, 
and  his  attitudes  and  gestures  assume  a  certain  dignity 
and  impressiveness.  His  conversation  is  fluent,  agree- 
able and  polite.  You  see  at  once  from  it  that  he  is  a 
man  of  decided  and  original  character.  His  views  are 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  147 

all  his  own  ;  such  as  he  has  worked  out  from  a  patient 
and  varied  scrutiny  of  life,  and  not  such  as  he  has 
learned  from  others.  Yet  he  cannot  be  called  opinion- 
ated. He  listens  to  others  like  one  eager  to  learn,  and 
his  replies  evince  at  the  same  time,  both  modesty  and 
self-reliance.  I  should  say  that  sound  common  sense 
was  the  principal  quality  of  his  mind,  although  at  times 
a  striking  phrase  or  word  reveals  a  peculiar  vein  of 
thought.  He  tells  a  story  well,  with  a  strong  idiomatic 
smack,  and  seems  to  relish  humor,  both  in  himself  and 
others.  Our  conversation  was  mainly  political,  but  of 
a  general  nature.  One  thing  Mr.  Lincoln  remarked, 
which  I  will  venture  to  repeat.  He  said  that  in  the 
coming  presidential  canvass  "he  was  wholly  uncommitted 
to  any  cabals  or  cliques,  and  that  he  meant  to  keep 
himself  free  from  them,  and  from  all  pledges  and 
promises. 

"  I  had  the  pleasure,  also,  of  a  brief  interview  with 
Mrs.  Lincoln,  and,  in  the  circumstances  of  these  per- 
sons, I  trust  I  am  not  trespassing  on  the  sanctities  of 
private  life,  in  saying  a  word  in  regard  to  that  lady. 
Whatever  of  awkwardness  may  be  ascribed  to  her 
husband,  there  is  none  of  it  in  her.  On  the  contrary, 
she  is  quite  a  pattern  of  lady-like  courtesy  and  polish. 
She  converses  with  freedom  and  grace,  and  is  thoroughly 
au  fait  in  all  the  little  amenities  of  society.  Mrs. 
Lincoln  belongs,  by  the  mother's  side,  to  the  Preston 
family  of  Kentucky,  has  received  a  liberal  and  refined 
education,  and  should  she  ever  reach  it,  will  adorn  the 
White-House.  She  is,  I  am  told,  a  strict  and  consis- 
tent member  of  the  Presbyterian  Church. 

"Not  a  man  of  us  who  saw  Mr.  Lincoln  but  was 
impressed  by  his  ability  and  character.  In  illustration 
of  the  last  let  me  mention  one  or  two  things,  which 
your  readers,  I  think,  will  be  pleased  to  hear.  Mr. 
Lincoln's  early  life,  as  you  know,  was  passed  in  the 
roughest  kind'of  experience  on  the  frontier,  and  among 
the  roughest  sort  pf  people.  Yet,  I  have  been  told 


148  LIFE     AND     SPEECHES    OF 

that,  in  the  face  of  all  these  influences,  he  is  a  strictly 
temperate  man,  never  using  wine  or  strong  drink  ;  and 
stranger  still,  he  does  not  '  twist  the  filthy  weed/  nor 
smoke,  nor  use  profane  language  of  any  kind.  When 
we  consider  how  common  these  vices  are  all  over  our 
country,  particularly  in  the  West,  it  must  be  admitted 
that  it  exhibits  no  little  strength  of  character  to  have 
refrained  from  them. 

"  Mr.  Lincoln  is  popular  with  his  friends  and  neigh- 
bors ;  the  habitual  equity  of  his  mind  points  him  out 
as  a  peacemaker  and  composer  of  difficulties ;  his 
integrity  is  proverbial  ;  and  his  legal  abilities  are 
regarded  as  of  the  highest  order.  The  soubriquet  of 
'  Honest  old  Abe/  has  been  won  by  years  of  upright 
conduct,  and  is  the  popular  homage  to  his  probity. 
He  carries  the  marks  of  honesty  in  his  face  and  entire 
deportment. 

"I  am  the  more  convinced  by  this  personal  inter- 
course with  Mr.  Lincoln,  that  the  action  of  our  Con- 
vention was  altogether  judicious  and  proper." 

The  Tribune  gives  the  subjoined  incident  : 

"  Probably  no  attribute  of  our  candidate  will,  after 
all,  endear  him  so  much  to  the  popular  heart  as  the 
cooviction  that  he  is  emphatically  '  one  of  the  people.' 
His  manhood  has  not  been  compressed  into  the  artificial 
track  of  society  ;  but  his  great  heart  and  vigorous  in- 
tellect have  been  allowed  a  generous  development  amid 
his  solitary  struggles  in  the  forest  and  the  prairie. 
With  vision  unobscured  by  the  mists  of  sophistry,  he 
distinguishes  at  the  first  glance  between  what  is  true 
and  what  is  false,  and  with  will  and  courage  fortified 
by  his  life  of  hardship,  he  is  not  the  man  to  shirk  any 
responsibility,  or  to  shrink  from  any  opposition.  More- 
over, he  is  peculiarly  one  to  win  our  confidence  and 
affection.  To  know  { honest  Abe'  is  to  love  him  ;  and 
his  neighbors  in  the  West,  although  voting  for  him  to 
a  man,  will  mourn  the  victory  which  is  to  deprive  them 


ABRAHAM     LINCOLN.  149 

of  his  presence.  The  following  incident  will  exhibit 
Lincoln  in  one  of  those  unobtrusive  acts  of  goodness 
which  adorn  his  life.  The  circumstance  was  related  by 
a  teacher  from  the  Five-Points'  House  of  Industry  in 
this  city  :  'Our  Sunday-school  in  the  Five-Points  was 
assembled,  one  Sabbath  morning,  a  few  months  since, 
when  I  noticed  a  tall  and  remarkable  looking  man  enter 
the  room  and  take  a  seat  among  us.  He  listened  with 
fixed  attention  to  our  exercises,  and  his  countenance 
manifested  such  genuine  interest,  that  I  approached 
him  and  suggested  that  he  might  be  willing  to  say 
something  to  the  children.  He  accepted  the  invitation 
with  evident  pleasure,  and  coming  forward,  began  a 
simple  address,  which  at  once  fascinated  every  little 
hearer,  and  hushed  the  room  into  silence.  His  lan- 
guage was  strikingly  beautiful,  and  his  tones  musical 
with  intensest  feeling.  The  little  faces  around  would 
droop  into  sad  conviction,  as  he  uttered  sentences  of 
warning,  and  would  brighten  into  sunshine  as  he  spoke 
cheerful  words  of  promise.  Once  or  twice  he  attempted 
to  close  his  remarks,  but  the  imperative  shout  of  "  Gro 
on  I"  "  Oh,  do  go  on  !"  would  compel  him  to  resume. 
As  I  looked  upon  the  gaunt  and  sinewy  frame  of  the 
stranger,  and  marked  his  powerful  head  and  deter- 
mined features,  now  touched  into  softness  by  the  im- 
pressions of  the  moment,  I  felt  an  irrepressible  curiosity 
to  learn  something  more  about  him,  and  when  he  was 
quietly  leaving  the  room,  I  begged  to  know  his  name. 
He  courteously  replied,  "  It  is  Abraham  Lincoln,  from 
Illinois!"'" 

That  the  Convention  at  Chicago  acted  wisely  and 
sagaciously,  no  man  can  for  a  moment  doubt  who  looks 
over  the  field  and  sees  the  enthusiasm  of  the  people 
over  the  nominations.  That  Lincoln  and  Hamlin  can 
be,  and  ivill  be,  elected  to  the  places  to  which  they  have 
been  nominated  we  have  no  manner  of  doubt,  and  we 


150  ABRAHAM      LINCOLN. 

cannot  do  better  than  to  finish  our  sketch  of  Mr.  Lin- 
coln by  quoting  the  following  admirable  song  of  one  of 
America's  most  gifted  sons,  William  Henry  Burleigh, 
of  New- York : 

Up,  again  for  the  conflict!  our  banner  fling  out, 

And  rally  around  it  with  song  and  with  shout ! 

Stout  of  heart,  firm  of  hand,  should  the  gallant  boys  be, 

Who  bear  to  the  battle  the  Flag  of  the  Free ! 

Like  our  fathers,  when  Liberty  called  to  the  strife, 

They  should  pledge  to  her  cause  fortune,  honor,  and  life  ! 

And  follow  wherever  she  beckons  them  on, 

Till  Freedom  exults  in  a  victory  won ! 

Then  fling  out  the  banner,  the  old  starry  banner, 

The  battle-torn  banner  that  beckons  us  on  ! 

They  come  from  the  hillside,  they  come  from  the  glen — 
From  the  streets  thronged  with  traffic,  and  surging  with  men 
From  loom  and  from  ledger,  from  workshop  and  farm, 
The  fearless  of  heart,  and  the  mighty  of  arm. 
As  the  mountain-born  torrenta  exultingly  leap, 
When  their  ice-fetters  melt,  to  the  breast  of  the  deep  ; 
As  the  winds  of  the  prairie,  the  waves  of  the  sea, 
They  are  coming — are  coming— the  Sons  of  the  Free  ! 
Then  fling  out  the  banner,  the  old  starry  banner, 
The  war-tattered  banner,  the  flag  of  the  Free  ! 

Our  Leader  is  one  who,  with  conquerless  will, 

Has  climbed  from  the  base  to  the  brow  of  the  hill ; 

Undaunted  in  peril,  unwavering  in  strife, 

He  has  fought  a  good  fight  in  the  Battle  of  Life 

And  we  trust  him  as  one  who,  come  woe  or  come  weal, 

Is  as  firm  as  the  rock,  and  as  true  aa  the  steel, 

Eight  loyal  and  brave,  with  no  stain  on  his  crest, 

Then,  hurrah,  boys,  for  honest  "Old  Abe  of  the  West !" 
And  fling  out  your  banner,  the  old  starry  banner, 
The  signal  of  triumph  for  "  Abe  of  the  Wett !" 

The  West,  whose  broad  acres,  from  lake-shore  to  sea, 

Now  wait  for  the  harvest  and  homes  of  the  ftce  1 

Shall  the  dark  tide  of  Slavery  roll  o'er  the  sod, 

That  Freedom  makes  bloom  like  the  garden  of  God  ? 

The  bread  of  our  children  be  torn  from  their  mouth, 

To  feed  the  fierce  dragon  that  preys  on  the  South  ? 

No,  never !  the  trust  which  our  Washington  laid 

On  us,  for  the  Future,  shall  ne'er  be  betrayed  1 

Then  fling  out  the  banner,  the  old  etarry  banner, 
And  on  to  the  conflict  with  hearts  undismayed  1 


WILLIAM  \7YLES  LIBRAE* 

U:J:VF..T- /;v  OP  CALIFORNIA 
SANTA  B, \:X;vAUA.  COLLEGE 

. 


THE  LIBRARY 
UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 

Santa  Barbara 


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RETD  DEC  02199614 


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